No. 


Please  do  not  delay  the  return. 


7 


/ft'/ 


THE 


TENT   ON   THE   BEACH 


AND 


OTHER    POEMS. 


BY 


JOHN    GREENLEAF    WHITTIER. 


BOSTON: 
TICKNOR    AND    FIELDS. 

1867. 


Univ.  Library,  UC Santa  Crut 1989 


Entered  according  to  Act  of  Congress,  in  the  year  1867,  by 

JOHN    GREENLEAF    WHITTIER, 
in  the  Clerk's  Office  of  the  District  Court  of  the  District  of  Massachusetts. 


UNIVERSITY  PRESS  :  WELCH,  BIGELOW,  &  Co., 
CAMBRIDGE. 


?s 


A 


I  WOULD  not  sin,  in  this  half-playful  strain,  — 

Too  light  perhaps  for  serious  years,  though  born 
Of  the  enforced  leisure  of  slow  pain,  — 

Against  the  pure  ideal  which  has  drawn 
My  feet  to  follow  its  far-shining  gleam. 
A  simple  plot  is  mine  :   legends  and  nines 
Of  credulous  days,  old  fancies  that  have  lain 
Silent  from  boyhood  taking  voice  again, 
Warmed  into  life  once  more,  even  as  the  tunes 
That,  frozen  in  the  fabled  hunting-horn, 
Thawed  into  sound  :  —  a  winter  fireside  dream 
Of  dawns  and  sunsets  by  the  summer  sea, 
Whose  sands  are  traversed  by  a  silent  throng 
Of  voyagers  from  that  vaster  mystery 
Of  which  it  is  an  emblem ;  —  and  the  dear 
Memory  of  one  who  might  have  tuned  my  song 
To  sweeter  music  by  her  delicate  ear. 


ist  month,  1867. 


CONTENTS. 

PAGE 

THE    TENT    ON   THE    BEACH 7 

THE  WRECK  OF  RIVERMOUTH 22 

THE  GRAVE  BY  THE  LAKE 32 

THE  BROTHER  OF  MERCY 52 

THE  CHANGELING 57 

THE  MAIDS  OF  ATTITASH 65 

KALLUNDBORG  CHURCH 74 

THE  DEAD  SHIP  OF  HARPSWELL 85 

THE  PALATINE 90 

ABRAHAM  DAVENPORT    .               98 

NATIONAL    LYRICS. 

THE  MANTLE  OF  ST.  JOHN  DE  MATHA    .        .        .        .  in 

WHAT  THE  BIRDS  SAID 119 

LAUS  DEO  ! 122 

THE  PEACE  AUTUMN 127 

To  THE  THIRTY-NINTH  CONGRESS 131 


VI  CONTENTS. 

OCCASIONAL    POEMS. 

THE  ETERNAL  GOODNESS 137 


OUR  MASTER 143 

THE  VANISHERS 153 

REVISITED 161 

THE  COMMON  QUESTION 162 

BRYANT  ON  HIS  BIRTHDAY 165 

HYMN 167 

THOMAS  STARR  KING 171 


THE   TENT   ON   THE    BEACH. 


THE    TENT    ON    THE    BEACH. 


\  T  THEN  heats  as  of  a  tropic  clime 

Burned  all  our  inland  valleys  through, 
Three  friends,  the  guests  of  summer  time, 

Pitched  their  white  tent  where  sea-winds  blew. 
Behind  them,  marshes,  seamed  and  crossed 
With  narrow  creeks,  and  flower-embossed, 
Stretched  to  the  dark  oak  wood,  whose  leafy  arms 
Screened  from  the  stormy  East  the  pleasant  inland 
farms. 


IO  THE   TENT    ON    THE   BEACH. 

At  full  of  tide  their  bolder  shore 

_ 

Of  sun-bleached  sand  the  waters  beat ; 
At  ebb,  a  smooth  and  glistening  floor 

They  touched  with  light,  receding  feet. 
Northward  a  green  bluff  broke  the  chain 
Of  sand-hills  ;  southward  stretched  a  plain 
Of  salt  grass,  with  a  river  winding  down, 
Sail-whitened,  and  beyond  the  steeples  of  the  town, 


Whence  sometimes,  when  the  wind  was  light 

And  dull  the  thunder  of  the  beach, 
They  heard  the  bells  of  morn  and  night 
Swing,  miles  away,  their  silver  speech. 
Above  low  scarp  and  turf-grown  wall 
They  saw  the  fort  flag  rise  and  fall ; 
And,  the  first  star  to  signal  twilight's  hour, 
The  lamp-fire    glimmer  down   from  the    tall  light- 
house tower. 


THE   TENT    ON    THE    BEACH.  II 

They  rested  there,  escaped  awhile 

From  cares  that  wear  the  life  away, 
To  eat  the  lotus  of  the  Nile 

And  drink  the  poppies  of  Cathay, — 
To  fling  their  loads  of  custom  down, 
Like  drift-weed,  on  the  sand-slopes  brown, 
And  in  the  sea  waves  drown  the  restless  pack 
Of  duties,  claims,  and  needs  that  barked  upon  their 
track. 

One,  with  his  beard  scarce  silvered,  bore 

A  ready  credence  in  his  looks, 
A  lettered  magnate,  lording  o'er 

An  ever-widening  realm  of  books. 
In  him  brain-currents,  near  and  far, 
Converged  as  in  a  Leyden  jar  ; 
The  old,  dead  authors  thronged  him  round  about, 
And    Elzevir's    gray   ghosts    from    leathern    graves 
looked  out. 


12  THE   TENT   ON   THE   BEACH. 

He  knew  each  living  pundit  well, 

• 

Could  weigh  the  gifts  of  him  or  her, 
And  well  the  market  value  tell 

Of  poet  and  philosopher. 
But  if  he  lost,  the  scenes  behind, 
Somewhat  of  reverence  vague  and  blind, 
Finding  the  actors  human  at  the  best, 
No  readier  lips  than  his  the  good  he  saw  confessed. 


His  boyhood  fancies  not  outgrown, 
He  loved  himself  the  singer's  art ; 

Tenderly,  gently,  by  his  own 

He  knew  and  judged  an  author's  heart. 

No  Rhadamanthine  brow  of  doom 

Bowed  the  dazed  pedant  from  his  room  ; 


And  bards,  whose  name  is  legion,  if  denied, 
Bore  off  alike  intact  their  verses  and  their  pride. 


THE   TENT   ON   THE   BEACH.  13 

Pleasant  it  was  to  roam  about 

The  lettered  world  as  he  had  done, 
And  see  the  lords  of  song  without 

Their  singing  robes  and  garlands  on. 
With  Wordsworth  paddle  Rydal  mere, 
Taste  rugged  Elliott's  home-brewed  beer, 
And  with  the  ears  of  Rogers,  at  fourscore, 
Hear  Garrick's  buskined  tread  and  Walpole's  wit 
once  more. 

And  one  there  was,  a  dreamer  born, 

Who,  with  a  mission  to  fulfil, 
Had  left  the  Muses'  haunts  to  turn 

The  crank  of  an  opinion-mill, 
Making  his  rustic  reed  of  song 
A  weapon  in  the  war  with  wrong, 
Yoking  his  fancy  to  the  breaking-plough 
That  beam-deep  turned  the  soil  for  truth  to  spring 
and  grow. 


14  THE   TENT    ON    THE   BEACH. 


Too  quiet  seemed  the  man  to  ride 

The  winged  Hippogriff  Reform  ; 

Was  his  a  voice  from  side  to  side 

To  pierce  the  tumult  of  the  storm  ? 
A  silent,  shy,  peace-loving  man, 
He  seemed  no  fiery  partisan 
To  hold  his  way  against  the  public  frown, 
The   ban    of  Church   and    State,    the   fierce   mob's 
hounding  down. 


For  while  he  wrought  with  strenuous  will 

The  work  his  hands  had  found  to  do, 
He  heard  the  fitful  music  still 

Of  winds  that  out  of  dream-land  blew. 
The  din  about  him  could  not  drown 
What  the  strange  voices  whispered  down  ; 
Along  his  task-field  weird  processions  swept, 
The  visionary  pomp  of  stately  phantoms  stepped. 


THE   TENT    ON    THE   BEACH.  15 

The  common  air  was  thick  with  dreams, — 

He  told  them  to  the  toiling  crowd  ; 
Such  music  as  the  woods  and  streams 

Sang  in  his  ear  he  sang  aloud  ; 
In  still,  shut  bays,  on  windy  capes, 
He  heard  the  call  of  beckoning  shapes, 
And,  as  the  gray  old  shadows  prompted  him, 
To   homely  moulds  of  rhyme   he   shaped   their   le- 
gends grim. 

He  rested  now  his  weary  hands, 

And  lightly  moralized  and  laughed, 
As,  tracing  on  the  shifting  sands 
A  burlesque  of  his  paper-craft, 
He  saw  the  careless  waves  o'errun 
His  words,  as  time  before  had  done, 
Each  day's  tide-water  washing  clean  away, 
Like  letters  from  the  sand,  the  work  of  yesterday. 


1 6  THE   TENT   ON    THE    BEACH. 

And  one,  whose  Arab  face  was  tanned 

By  tropic  sun  and  boreal  frost, 
So  travelled  there  was  scarce  a  land 

Or  people  left  him  to  exhaust, 
In  idling  mood  had  from  him  hurled 
The  poor  squeezed  orange  of  the  world, 
And  in  the  tent-shade,  as  beneath  a  palm, 
Smoked,  cross-legged  like  a  Turk,  in  Oriental  calm. 


The  very  waves  that  washed  the  sand 

Below  him,  he  had  seen  before 
Whitening  the  Scandinavian  strand 

And  sultry  Mauritanian  shore. 
From  ice-rimmed  isles,  from  summer  seas 
Palm-fringed,  they  bore  him  messages  ; 
He  heard  the  plaintive  Nubian  songs  again, 
And  mule-bells   tinkling  down   the   mountain-paths 
of  Spain. 


THE   TENT    ON   THE   BEACH.  I/ 

His  memory  round  the  ransacked  earth 

On  Ariel's  girdle  slid  at  ease ; 
And,  instant,  to  the  valley's  girth 

Of  mountains,  spice  isles  of  the  seas, 
Faith  flowered  in  minster  stones,  Art's  guess 
At  truth  and  beauty,  found  access ; 
Yet  loved  the  while,  that  free  cosmopolite, 
Old    friends,    old    ways,    and    kept    his    boyhood's 
dreams  in  sight. 

Untouched  as  yet  by  wealth  and  pride, 

That  virgin  innocence  of  beach : 
No  shingly  monster,  hundred-eyed, 

Stared  its  gray  sand-birds  out  of  reach  ; 
Unhoused,  save  where,  at  intervals, 
The  white  tents  showed  their  canvas  walls, 
Where  brief  sojourners,  in  the  cool,  soft  air, 
Forgot  their  inland  heats,  hard  toil,  and   year-long 
care. 


1 8  THE   TENT    ON    THE    BEACH. 

Sometimes  along  the  wheel-deep  sand 
A  one-horse  wagon  slowly  crawled, 
Deep  laden  with  a  youthful  band, 

Whose  look  some  homestead  old  recalled ; 
Brother  perchance,  and  sisters  twain, 
And  one  whose  blue  eyes  told,  more  plain 
Than  the  free  language  of  her  rosy  lip, 
Of  the  still  dearer  claim  of  love's  relationship. 


With  cheeks  of  russet-orchard  tint, 

The  light  laugh  of  their  native  rills, 
The  perfume  of  their  garden's  mint, 

The  breezy  freedom  of  the  hills, 
They  bore,  in  unrestrained  delight, 
The  motto  of  the  Garter's  knight, 
Careless  as  if  from  every  gazing  thing 
Hid  by  their  innocence,  as  Gyges  by  his  ring. 


THE   TENT   ON   THE   BEACH.  19 

The  clanging  sea-fowl  came  and  went, 

The  hunter's  gun  in  the  marshes  rang  ; 
At  nightfall  from  a  neighboring  tent 
A  flute-voiced  woman  sweetly  sang. 
Loose-haired,  barefooted,  hand  in  hand, 
Young  girls  went  tripping  down  the  sand  ; 
And  youths  and  maidens,  sitting  in  the  moon, 
Dreamed   o'er  the  old   fond  dream  from  which  we 
wake  too  soon. 

At  times  their  fishing-lines  they  plied, 

With  an  old  Triton  at  the  oar, 
Salt  as  the  sea-wind,  tough  and  dried 

As  a  lean  cusk  from  Labrador. 
Strange  tales  he  told  of  wreck  and  storm,  — 
Had  seen  the  sea-snake's  awful  form, 
And  heard  the  ghosts  on  Haley's  Isle  complain, 
Speak  him   off   shore,   and   beg   a   passage   to   old 
Spain  ! 


2O  THE   TENT   ON   THE   BEACH. 

And  there,  on  breezy  morns,  they  saw 

The  fishing-schooners  outward  run, 
Their  low-bent  sails  in  tack  and  flaw 

Turned  white  or  dark  to  shade  and  sun. 
Sometimes,  in  calms  of  closing  day, 
They  watched  the  spectral  mirage  play, 
Saw  low,  far  islands  looming  tall  and  nigh, 
And  ships,  with  upturned  keels,  sail  like  a  sea  the 
sky. 

Sometimes  a  cloud,  with  thunder  black, 

Stooped  low  upon  the  darkening  main, 
Piercing  the  waves  along  its  track 

With  the  slant  javelins  of  rain. 
And  when  west-wind  and  sunshine  warm 
Chased  out  to  sea  its  wrecks  of  storm, 
They  saw  the  prismy  hues  in  thin  spray  showers 
Where   the   green   buds  of  waves   burst  into  white 
froth  flowers. 


THE   TENT   ON    THE   BEACH.  21 

And  when  along  the  line  of  shore 

The  mists  crept  upward  chill  and  damp, 
Stretched,  careless,  on  their  sandy  floor 

Beneath  the  flaring  lantern  lamp, 
They  talked  of  all  things  old  and  new, 
Read,  slept,  and  dreamed  as  idlers  do  ; 
And  in  the  unquestioned  freedom  of  the  tent, 
Body  and  o'er-taxed  mind  to  healthful  ease  unbent. 


Once,  when  the  sunset  splendors  died, 
And,  trampling  up  the  sloping  sand, 
In  lines  outreaching  far  and  wide, 

The  white-maned  billows  swept  to  land, 
Dim  seen  across  the  gathering  shade, 
A  vast  and  ghostly  cavalcade, 
They  sat  around  their  lighted  kerosene, 
Hearing  the  deep  bass   roar   their   every  pause  be- 
tween. 


22  THE   TENT    ON    THE   BEACH. 

Then,  urged  thereto,  the  Editor 

Within  his  full  portfolio  dipped, 
Feigning  excuse  while  searching  for 

(With  secret  pride)  his  manuscript. 
His  pale  face  flushed  from  eye  to  beard, 
With  nervous  cough  his  throat  he  cleared, 
And,  in  a  voice  so  tremulous  it  betrayed 
The  anxious  fondness  of  an  author's  heart,  he  read : 


THE    WRECK    OF    RIVERMOUTH. 

RIVERMOUTH  Rocks  are  fair  to  see, 
By  dawn  or  sunset  shone  across, 
When  the  ebb  of  the  sea  has  left  them  free, 

To  dry  their  fringes  of  gold-green  moss : 
For  there  the  river  comes  winding  down 
From  salt  sea-meadows  and  uplands  brown, 
And  waves  on  the  outer  rocks  afoam 
Shout  to  its  waters,  "  Welcome  home  ! " 


THE   WRECK   OF   RIVERMOUTH.  23 

And  fair  are  the  sunny  isles  in  view 

East  of  the  grisly  Head  of  the  Boar, 
And  Agamenticus  lifts  its  blue 

Disk  of  a  cloud  the  woodlands  o'er  ; 
And  southerly,  when  the  tide  is  down, 
'Twixt  white  sea-waves  and  sand-hills  brown, 
The  beach-birds  dance  and  the  gray  gulls  wheel 
Over  a  floor  of  burnished  steel. 


Once,  in  the  old  Colonial  days, 

Two  hundred  years  ago  and  more, 
A  boat  sailed  down  through  the  winding  ways 

Of  Hampton  River  to  that  low  shore, 
Full  of  a  goodly  company 
Sailing  out  on  the  summer  sea, 
Veering  to  catch  the  land-breeze  light, 
With  the  Boar  to  left  and  the  Rocks  to  right. 


24  THE    TENT    ON    THE    BEACH. 

In  Hampton  meadows,  where  mowers  laid 

Their  scythes  to  the  swaths  of  salted  grass, 
"Ah,  well-a-day !  our  hay  must  be  made!" 

A  young  man  sighed,  who  saw  them  pass. 
Loud  laughed  his  fellows  to  see  him  stand 
Whetting  his  scythe  with  a  listless  hand, 
Hearing  a  voice  in  a  far-off  song, 
Watching  a  white  hand  beckoning  long. 


"  Fie  on  the  witch ! "  cried  a  merry  girl, 

As  they  rounded  the  point  where  Goody  Cole 

Sat  by  her  door  with  her  wheel  atwirl, 
A  bent  and  blear-eyed  poor  old  soul. 

"  Oho  ! "  she  muttered,  "  ye  're  brave  to-day  ! 

But  I  hear  the  little  waves  laugh  and  say, 

1  The  broth  will  be  cold  that  waits  at  home ; 

For  it 's  one  to  go,  but  another  to  come ! ' ' 


THE   WRECK   OF    RI VERMOUTH.  25 

"  She  's  cursed,"  said  the  skipper ;  "  speak  her  fair  : 

I  'm  scary  always  to  see  her  shake 
Her  wicked  head,  with  its  wild  gray  hair, 

And  nose  like  a  hawk,  and  eyes  like  a  snake." 
But  merrily  still,  with  laugh  and  shout, 
From  Hampton  River  the  boat  sailed  out, 
Till  the  huts  and  the  flakes  on  Star  seemed  nigh, 
And  they  lost  the  scent  of  the  pines  of  Rye. 


They  dropped  their  lines  in  the  lazy  tide, 
Drawing  up  haddock  and  mottled  cod  ; 
They  saw  not  the  Shadow  that  walked  beside, 

They  heard  not  the  feet  with  silence  shod. 
But  thicker  and  thicker  a  hot  mist  grew, 
Shot  by  the  lightnings  through  and  through  ; 
And  muffled  growls,  like  the  growl  of  a  beast, 
Ran  along  the  sky  from  west  to  east. 


26  THE   TENT    ON    THE    BEACH. 


Then  the  skipper  looked  from  the  darkening  sea 
Up  to  the  dimmed  and  wading  sun  ; 

But  he  spake  like  a  brave  man  cheerily, 
"Yet  there  is  time  for  our  homeward  run." 

Veering  and  tacking,  they  backward  wore ; 

And  just  as  a  breath  from  the  woods  ashore 

Blew  out  to  whisper  of  danger  past, 

The  wrath  of  the  storm  came  down  at  last ! 


The  skipper  hauled  at  the  heavy  sail : 
"  God  be  our  help  ! "  he  only  cried, 
As  the  roaring  gale,  like  the  stroke  of  a  flail, 

Smote  the  boat  on  its  starboard  side. 
The  Shoalsmen  looked,  but  saw  alone 
Dark  films  of  rain-cloud  slantwise  blown, 
Wild  rocks  lit  up  by  the  lightning's  glare, 
The  strife  and  torment  of  sea  and  air. 


THE   WRECK   OF   RIVERMOUTH.  2/ 

Goody  Cole  looked  out  from  her  door: 

The  Isles  of  Shoals  were  drowned  and  gone, 
Scarcely  she  saw  the  Head  of  the  Boar 

Toss  the  foam  from  tusks  of  stone. 
She  clasped  her  hands  with  a  grip  of  pain, 
The  tear  on  her  cheek  was  not  of  rain : 
"  They  are  lost,"  she  muttered,  "  boat  and  crew  ! 
Lord,  forgive  me !  my  words  were  true  ! " 


Suddenly  seaward  swept  the  squall ; 

The  low  sun  smote  through  cloudy  rack  ; 
The  Shoals  stood  clear  in  the  light,  and  all 

The  trend  of  the  coast  lay  hard  and  black. 
But  far  and  wide  as  eye  could  reach, 
No  life  was  seen  upon  wave  or  beach  ; 
The  boat  that  went  out  at  morning  never 
Sailed  back  again  into  Hampton  River. 


28  THE   TENT    ON    THE   BEACH. 

O  mower,  lean  on  thy  bended  snath, 

Look  from  the  meadows  green  and  low 
The  wind  of  the  sea  is  a  waft  of  death, 

The  waves  are  singing  a  song  of  woe  ! 
By  silent  river,  by  moaning  sea, 
Long  and  vain  shall  thy  watching  be : 
Never  again  shall  the  sweet  voice  call, 
Never  the  white  hand  rise  and  fall ! 


O  Rivermouth  Rocks,  how  sad  a  sight 

Ye  saw  in  the  light  of  breaking  day ! 
Dead  faces  looking  up  cold  and  white 

From  sand  and  sea-weed  where  they  lay 
The  mad  old  witch-wife  wailed  and  wept, 
And  cursed  the  tide  as  it  backward  crept : 
"  Crawl  back,  crawl  back,  blue  water-snake  ! 
Leave  your  dead  for  the  hearts  that  break  ! " 


THE    WRECK   OF    RIVERMOUTH. 

Solemn  it  was  in  that  old  day 

In  Hampton  town  and  its  log-built  church, 
Where  side  by  side  the  coffins  lay 

And  the  mourners  stood  in  aisle  and  porch. 
In  the  singing-seats  young  eyes  were  dim, 
The  voices  faltered  that  raised  the  hymn, 
And  Father  Dalton,  grave  and  stern, 
Sobbed  through  his  prayer  and  wept  in  turn. 


But  his  ancient  colleague  did  not  pray, 
Because  of  his  sin  at  fourscore  years : 
He  stood  apart,  with  the  iron-gray 

Of  his  strong  brows  knitted  to  hide  his  tears. 
And  a  wretched  woman,  holding  her  breath 
In  the  awful  presence  of  sin  and  death, 
Cowered  and  shrank,  while  her  neighbors  thronged 
To  look  on  the  dead  her  shame  had  wronged. 


3O  THE   TENT    ON    THE    BEACH. 

Apart  with  them,  like  them  forbid, 

Old  Goody  Cole  looked  drearily  round, 
As,  two  by  two,  with  their  faces  hid, 

The  mourners  walked  to  the  burying-ground. 
She  let  the  staff  from  her  clasped  hands  fall : 
"  Lord,  forgive  us  !   we  're  sinners  all ! " 
And  the  voice  of  the  old  man  answered  her : 
"Amen!"  said  Father  Bachiler. 


So,  as  I  sat  upon  Appledore 

In  the  calm  of  a  closing  summer  day, 
And  the  broken  lines  of  Hampton  shore 

In  purple  mist  of  cloudland  lay, 
The  Rivermouth  Rocks  their  story  told  ; 
And  waves  aglow  with  sunset  gold, 
Rising  and  breaking  in  steady  chime, 
Beat  the  rhythm  and  kept  the  time. 


THE   WRECK   OF    RIVERMOUTH.  31 

And  the  sunset  paled,  and  warmed  once  more 

With  a  softer,  tenderer  after-glow ; 
In  the  east  was  moon-rise,  with  boats  off-shore 

And  sails  in  the  distance  drifting  slow. 
The  beacon  glimmered  from  Portsmouth  bar, 
The  White  Isle  kindled  its  great  red  star  ; 
And  life  and  death  in  my  old-time  lay 
Mingled  in  peace  like  the  night  and  day ! 


"  Well ! "  said  the  Man  of  Books,  "  your  story 

Is  not  ill  told  in  pleasant  verse. 
As  the  Celt  said  of  purgatory, 

One  might  go  farther  and  fare  worse." 
The  reader  smiled ;  and  once  again 
With  steadier  voice  took  up  his  strain, 
While  the  fair  singer  from  the  neighboring  tent 
Drew  near,  and  at  his  side  a  graceful  listener  bent. 


32  THE   TENT    ON    THE    BEACH. 


THE    GRAVE    BY    THE    LAKE. 

WHERE  the  Great  Lake's  sunny  smiles 
Dimple  round  its  hundred  isles, 
And  the  mountain's  granite  ledge 
Cleaves  the  water  like  a  wedge, 
Ringed  about  with  smooth,  gray  stones, 
Rest  the  giant's  mighty  bones. 


Close  beside,  in  shade  and  gleam, 
Laughs  and  ripples  Melvin  stream  ; 
Melvin  water,  mountain-born, 
All  fair  flowers  its  banks  adorn ; 
All  the  woodland's  voices  meet, 
Mingling  with  its  murmurs  sweet 


THE  GRAVE  BY  THE  LAKE.  33 

Over  lowlands  forest-grown, 
Over  waters  island-strown, 
Over  silver-sanded  beach, 
Leaf-locked  bay  and  misty  reach, 
Melvin  stream  and  burial-heap, 
Watch  and  ward  the  mountains  keep. 


Who  that  Titan  cromlech  fills? 
Forest-kaiser,  lord  o'  the  hills  ? 
Knight  who  on  the  birchen  tree 
Carved  his  savage  heraldry  ? 
Priest  o'  the  pine-wood  temples  dim, 
Prophet,  sage,  or  wizard  grim  ? 

Rugged  type  of  primal  man, 

Grim  utilitarian, 

Loving  woods  for  hunt  and  prowl, 

2* 


34  THE   TENT    ON    THE    BEACH. 

Lake  and  hill  for  fish  and  fowl, 
As  the  brown  bear  blind  and  dull 
To  the  grand  and  beautiful : 


Not  for  him  the  lesson  drawn 
From  the  mountains  smit  with  dawn. 
Star-rise,  moon-rise,  flowers  of  May, 
Sunset's  purple  bloom  of  day,  — 
Took  his  life  no  hue  from  thence, 
Poor  amid  such  affluence  ? 

Haply  unto  hill  and  tree 
All  too  near  akin  was  he  : 
Unto  him  who  stands  afar 
Nature's  marvels  greatest  are ; 
Who  the  mountain  purple  seeks 
Must  not  climb  the  higher  peaks. 


THE  GRAVE  BY  THE  LAKE.  35 

Yet  who  knows  in  winter  tramp, 
Or  the  midnight  of  the  camp, 
What  revealings  faint  and  far, 
Stealing  down  from  moon  and  star, 
Kindled  in  that  human  clod 
Thought  of  destiny  and  God  ? 

Stateliest  forest  patriarch, 

Grand  in  robes  of  skin  and  bark, 

What  sepulchral  mysteries, 

What  weird  funeral-rites,  were  his  ? 

What  sharp  wail,  what  drear  lament, 

Back  scared  wolf  and  eagle  sent  ? 

Now,  whatever  he  may  have  been, 

Low  he  lies  as  other  men  ; 

On  his  mound  the  partridge  drums, 


36  THE   TENT   ON   THE   BEACH. 

There  the  noisy  blue-jay  comes  ; 
Rank  nor  name  nor  pomp  has  he 
In  the  grave's  democracy. 


Part  thy  blue  lips,  Northern  lake  ! 
Moss-grown  rocks,  your  silence  break ! 
Tell  the  tale,  thou  ancient  tree  ! 
Thou,  too,  slide-worn  Ossipee  ! 
Speak,  and  tell  us  how  and  when 
Lived  and  died  this  king  of  men  ! 

Wordless  moans  the  ancient  pine ; 
Lake  and  mountain  give  no  sign  ; 
Vain  to  trace  this  ring  of  stones  ; 
Vain  the  search  of  crumbling  bones  : 
Deepest  of  all  mysteries, 
And  the  saddest,  silence  is. 


THE  GRAVE  BY  THE  LAKE.  37 

Nameless,  noteless,  clay  with  clay 
Mingles  slowly  day  by  day  ; 
But  somewhere,  for  good  or  ill, 
That  dark  soul  is  living  still ; 
Somewhere  yet  that  atom's  force 
Moves  the  light-poised  universe. 

Strange  that  on  his  burial-sod 
Harebells  bloom,  and  golden-rod, 
While  the  soul's  dark  horoscope 
Holds  no  starry  sign  of  hope  ! 
Is  the  Unseen  with  sight  at  odds  ? 
Nature's  pity  more  than  God's  ? 

Thus  I  mused  by  Melvin  side, 
While  the  summer  eventide 
Made  the  woods  and  inland  sea 


38  THE   TENT    ON    THE   BEACH. 

And  the  mountains  mystery  ; 
And  the  hush  of  earth  and  air 
Seemed  the  pause  before  a  prayer,  — 


Prayer  for  him,  for  all  who  rest, 

Mother  Earth,  upon  thy  breast,  — 

Lapped  on  Christian  turf,  or  hid 

In  rock-cave  or  pyramid  : 

All  who  sleep,  as  all  who  live, 

Well  may  need  the  prayer,  "  Forgive  ! " 

Desert-smothered  caravan, 
Knee-deep  dust  that  once  was  man, 
Battle-trenches  ghastly  piled, 
Ocean-floors  with  white  bones  tiled, 
Crowded  tomb  and  mounded  sod, 
Dumbly  crave  that  prayer  to  God. 


THE  GRAVE  BY  THE  LAKE.  39 

O  the  generations  old 

Over  whom  no  church-bells  tolled, 

Christless,  lifting  up  blind  eyes 

To  the  silence  of  the  skies  ! 

For  the  innumerable  dead 

Is  my  soul  disquieted. 

Where  be  now  these  silent  hosts  ? 
Where  the  camping-ground  of  ghosts  ? 
Where  the  spectral  conscripts  led 
To  the  white  tents  of  the  dead  ? 
What  strange  shore  or  chartless  sea 
Holds  the  awful  mystery  ? 

Then  the  warm  sky  stooped  to  make 
Double  sunset  in  the  lake  ; 
While  above  I  saw  with  it, 
Range  on  range,  the  mountains  lit ; 


4O  THE   TENT   ON   THE   BEACH. 

And  the  calm  and  splendor  stole 
Like  an  answer  to  my  soul. 

Hear'st  thou,  O  of  little  faith, 
What  to  thee  the  mountain  saith, 
What  is  whispered  by  the  trees  ?  — 
"  Cast  on  God  thy  care  for  these  ; 
Trust  him,  if  thy  sight  be  dim  : 
Doubt  for  them  is  doubt  of  Him. 

"  Blind  must  be  their  close-shut  eyes 
Where  like  night  the  sunshine  lies, 
Fiery-linked  the  self-forged  chain 
Binding  ever  sin  to  pain, 
Strong  their  prison-house  of  will, 
But  without  He  waiteth  still. 

"  Not  with  hatred's  undertow 
Doth  the  Love  Eternal  flow  ; 


THE   GRAVE   BY   THE    LAKE.  4! 

Every  chain  that  spirits  wear 
Crumbles  in  the  breath  of  prayer  ; 
And  the  penitent's  desire 
Opens  every  gate  of  fire. 

"  Still  Thy  love,  O  Christ  arisen, 
Yearns  to  reach  these  souls  in  prison  ! 
Through  all  depths  of  sin  and  loss 
Drops  the  plummet  of  Thy  cross ! 
Never  yet  abyss  was  found 
Deeper  than  that  cross  could  sound  ! " 

Therefore  well  may  Nature  keep 
Equal  faith  with  all  who  sleep, 
Set  her  watch  of  hills  around 
Christian  grave  and  heathen  mound, 
And  to  cairn  and  kirkyard  send 
Summer's  flowery  dividend. 


42  THE   TENT    ON   THE    BEACH. 

Keep,  O  pleasant  Melvin  stream, 
Thy  sweet  laugh  in  shade  and  gleam  ! 
On  the  Indian's  grassy  tomb 
Swing,  O  flowers,  your  bells  of  bloom ! 
Deep  below,  as  high  above, 
Sweeps  the  circle  of  God's  love. 


He  paused  and  questioned  with  his  eye 

The  hearers'  verdict  on  his  song. 
A  low  voice  asked  :   "  Is  't  well  to  pry 

Into  the  secrets  which  belong 
Only  to  God?  — The  life  to  be 
Is  still  the  unguessed  mystery  : 
Our  part  is  simple  trust  and  reverent  awe, 
For  who  hath  known  His  mind,  or  been  His  coun- 
sellor ? 


THE   TENT   ON   THE   BEACH.  43 

"But  faith  beyond  our  sight  may  go." 

He  said :    "  The  gracious  Fatherhood 
Can  only  know  above,  below, 

Eternal  purposes  of  good. 
From  our  free  heritage  of  will, 
The  bitter  springs  of  pain  and  ill 
Flow  only  in  all  worlds.     The  perfect  day 
Of  God  is  shadowless,  and  love  is  love  alway." 


"  I  know,"  she  said,  "  the  letter  kills  ; 

That  on  our  arid  fields  of  strife 
And  heat  of  clashing  texts  distils 

The  dew  of  spirit  and  of  life. 
But,  searching  still  the  written  Word, 
I  fain  would  find,  Thus  saith  the  Lord, 
A  voucher  for  the  hope  I  also  feel 
That  sin   can  give  no  wound  beyond  love's  power 
to  heal." 


44  THE   TENT    ON    THE   BEACH. 

"  Pray,"  said  the  Man  of  Books,  "  give  o'er 

A  theme  too  vast  for  time  and  place. 
Go  on,  Sir  Poet,  ride  once  more 

Your  hobby  at  his  old  free  pace. 
But  let  him  keep,  with  step  discreet, 
The  solid  earth  beneath  his  feet. 
In  the  great  mystery  which  around  us  lies, 
The  wisest  is  a  fool,  the  fool  Heaven  helped  is  wise." 


The  Traveller  said  :   "  If  songs  have  creeds, 

Their  choice  of  them  let  singers  make  ; 
But  Art  no  other  sanction  needs 

Than  beauty  for  its  own  fair  sake. 
It  grinds  not  in  the  mill  of  use, 
Nor  asks  for  leave,  nor  begs  excuse  ; 
It  makes  the  flexile  laws  it  deigns  to  own, 
And  gives  its  atmosphere  its  color  and  its  tone. 


THE   TENT    ON   THE   BEACH.  45 

"  Confess,  old  friend,  your  austere  school 

Has  left  your  fancy  little  chance  ; 
You  square  to  reason's  rigid  rule 

The  flowing  outlines  of  romance. 
With  conscience  keen  from  exercise, 
And  chronic  fear  of  compromise, 
You  check  the  free  play  of  your  rhymes,  to  clap 
A  moral  underneath,  and  spring  it  like  a  trap." 


The  sweet  voice  answered :   "  Better  so 

Than  bolder  flights  that  know  no  check  ; 
Better  to  use  the  bit,  than  throw 

The  reins  all  loose  on  fancy's  neck. 
The  liberal  range  of  Art  should  be 
The  breadth  of  Christian  liberty, 
Restrained  alone  by  challenge  and  alarm 
Where  its  charmed  footsteps  tread  the  border  land 
of  harm. 


4-6  THE    TENT    ON    THE   BEACH. 

"Beyond  the  poet's  day-dream  lives 

The  eternal  epic  of  the  man. 
Be  thanks  to  him  who  only  gives, 

True  to  himself,  the  best  he  can. 
Of  narrow  scope  his  verse  may  seem, 
But  rippled  lake  and  singing  stream 
Find  fitting  audience,  in  themselves  complete 
As  the  great  sea  that  rolls  its  thunder  at  our  feet. 


"  In  sight  and  sound,  our  rugged  coast 

Shall  tell  of  him  from  year  to  year, 
Nor  lightly  shall  the  lays  be  lost 

That  homely  firesides  love  to  hear. 
For  still  on  truth's  and  nature's  tests 
The  common  heart  its  verdict  rests  ; 
By  simple  instinct  guided  in  its  choice, 
It  loves  the  song  that  lends  its  own  experience  voice." 


THE   TENT    ON    THE    BEACH.  47 

Laughing,  the  Critic  bowed.     "  I  yield 

The  point  without  another  word  ; 
Who  ever  yet  a  case  appealed 

Where  beauty's  judgment  had  been  heard  ? 
And  you,  my  good  friend,  owe  to  me 
Your  warmest  thanks  for  such  a  plea, 
As  true  withal  as  sweet.     For  my  offence 
Of  cavil,  let  her  praise  be  ample  recompense." 


Across  the  sea  one  large,  low  star, 

With  crimson  light  that  came  and  went, 
Revolving  on  its  tower  afar, 

Looked  through  the  doorway  of  the  tent. 
While  outward,  over  sand-slopes  wet, 
The  lamp  flashed  down  its  yellow  jet 
On  the  long  wash  of  waves,  with  red  and  green 
Tangles  of  weltering  weed  through  the  white  foam- 
wreaths  seen. 


48  THE  TENT    ON    THE    BEACH. 

"  '  Sing  while  we  may,  —  another  day 

May  bring  enough  of  sorrow  ' ;  —  thus 
Our  Traveller  in  his  own  sweet  lay, 

His  Crimean  camp-song,  hints  to  us," 
The  lady  said.     "  So  let  it  be ; 
Sing  us  a  song,"  exclaimed  all  three. 
She  smiled :  "  I  can  but  marvel  at  your  choice 
To  hear  our  poet's  words  through  my  poor  borrowed 
voice." 


Her  window  opens  to  the  bay, 
On  glistening  light  or  misty  gray, 
And  there  at  dawn  and  set  of  day 

In  prayer  she  kneels : 

"Dear  Lord!"   she  saith,  "to  many  a  home 
From  wind  and  wave  the  wanderers  come; 
I  only  see  the  tossing  foam 

Of  stranger  keels. 


THE   TENT    ON    THE    BEACH.  49 

"  Blown  out  and  in  by  summer  gales, 
The  stately  ships,  with  crowded  sails, 
And  sailors  leaning  o'er  their  rails, 

Before  me  glide ; 

They  come,  they  go,  but  nevermore, 
Spice-laden  from  the  Indian  shore, 
I  see  his  swift-winged  Isidore 

The  waves  divide. 


"  O  Thou  !  with  whom  the  night  is  day 
And  one  the  near  and  far  away, 
Look  out  on  yon  gray  waste,  and  say 

Where  lingers  he. 

Alive,  perchance,  on  some  lone  beach 
Or  thirsty  isle  beyond  the  reach 
Of  man,  he  hears  the  mocking  speech 

Of  wind  and  sea. 

3  D 


THE   TENT   ON   THE   BEACH. 

"  O  dread  and  cruel  deep,  reveal 
The  secret  which  thy  waves  conceal, 
And,  ye  wild  sea-birds,  hither  wheel 

And  tell  your  tale. 
Let  winds  that  tossed  his  raven  hair 
A  message  from  my  lost  one  bear,  — 
Some  thought  of  me,  a  last  fond  prayer 

Or  dying  wail ! 


"Come,  with  your  dreariest  truth  shut  out 
The  fears  that  haunt  me  round  about ; 
O  God  !   I  cannot  bear  this  doubt 

That  stifles  breath. 
The  worst  is  better  than  the  dread  ; 
Give  me  but  leave  to  mourn  my  dead 
Asleep  in  trust  and  hope,  instead 

Of  life  in  death  ! " 


THE   TENT    ON    THE    BEACH.  5! 

It  might  have  been  the  evening  breeze 
That  whispered  in  the  garden  trees, 
It  might  have  been  the  sound  of  seas 

That  rose  and  fell ; 
But,  with  her  heart,  if  not  her  ear, 
The  old  loved  voice  she  seemed  to  hear : 
"  I  wait  to  meet  thee :  be  of  cheer, 

For  all  is  well ! " 


The  sweet  voice  into  silence  went, 
While  a  low  murmur  of  applause 
From  lip  to  lip  ran  round  the  tent ; 
And,  after  brief  and  fitting  pause, 
Glancing  his  written  pages  o'er, 
The  Reader  tried  his  part  once  more  ; 
Leaving  the  land  of  hackmatack  and  pine 
For  Tuscan  valleys  glad  with  olive  and  with  vine. 


52  THE   TENT   ON   THE   BEACH. 


THE  BROTHER  OF  MERCY. 

PIERO  LUCA,  known  of  all  the  town 
As  the  gray  porter  by  the  Pitti  wall 
Where  the  noon  shadows  of  the  gardens  fall, 
Sick  and  in  dolor,  waited  to  lay  down 
His  last  sad  burden,  and  beside  his  mat 
The  barefoot  monk  of  La  Certosa  sat. 

Unseen,  in  square  and  blossoming  garden  drifted, 
Soft  sunset  lights  through  green  Val  d'  Arno  sifted  ; 
Unheard,  below  the  living  shuttles  shifted 
Backward  and  forth,  and  wove,  in  love  or  strife, 
In  mirth  or  pain,  the  mottled  web  of  life  : 
But  when  at  last  came  upward  from  the  street 
Tinkle  of  bell  and  tread  of  measured  feet, 
The  sick  man  started,  strove  to  rise  in  vain, 


THE   BROTHER   OF    MERCY.  53 

Sinking  back  heavily  with  a  moan  of  pain. 

And  the  monk  said,  "  T  is  but  the  Brotherhood 

Of  Mercy  going  on  some  errand  good  : 

Their  black  masks  by  the  palace-wall  I  see." 

Piero  answered  faintly,  "  Woe  is  me  ! 

This  day  for  the  first  time  in  forty  years 

In  vain  the  bell  hath  sounded  in  my  ears, 

Calling  me  with  my  brethren  of  the  mask, 

Beggar  and  prince  alike,  to  some  new  task 

Of  love  or  pity,  —  haply  from  the  street 

To  bear  a  wretch  plague-stricken,  or,  with  feet 

Hushed  to  the  quickened  ear  and  feverish  brain, 

To  tread  the  crowded  lazaretto's  floors, 

Down  the  long  twilight  of  the  corridors, 

'Midst  tossing  arms  and  faces  full  of  pain. 

I  loved  the  work  :   it  was  its  own  reward. 

I  never  counted  on  it  to  offset 

My  sins,  which  are  many,  or  make  less  my  debt 


54  THE   TENT    ON    THE    BEACH. 

To  the  free  grace  and  mercy  of  our  Lord  ; 

But  somehow,  father,  it  has  come  to  be 

In  these  long  years  so  much  a  part  of  me, 

I  should  not  know  myself,  if  lacking  it, 

But  with  the  work  the  worker  too  would  die, 

And  in  my  place  some  other  self  would  sit 

Joyful  or  sad,  —  what  matters,  if  not  I  ? 

And  now  all 's  over.     Woe  is  me  !  "  —  "  My  son," 

The  monk  said  soothingly,  "  thy  work  is  done  ; 

And  no  more  as  a  servant,  but  the  guest 

Of  God  thou  enterest  thy  eternal  rest. 

No  toil,  no  tears,  no  sorrow  for  the  lost 

Shall  mar  thy  perfect  bliss.     Thou  shalt  sit  down 

Clad  in  white  robes,  and  wear  a  golden  crown 

Forever  and  forever."  —  Piero  tossed 

On  his  sick  pillow  :   "  Miserable  me  ! 

I  am  too  poor  for  such  grand  company  ; 

The  crown  would  be  too  heavy  for  this  gray 


THE   BROTHER   OF    MERCY.  55 

Old  head  ;   and  God  forgive  me  if  I  say 

It  would  be  hard  to  sit  there  night  and  day, 

Like  an  image  in  the  Tribune,  doing  naught 

With  these  hard  hands,  that  all  my  life  have  wrought, 

Not  for  bread  only,  but  for  pity's  sake. 

I  'm  dull  at  prayers  :   I  could  not  keep  awake, 

Counting  my  beads.     Mine  's  but  a  crazy  head, 

Scarce  worth  the  saving,  if  all  else  be  dead. 

And  if  one  goes  to  heaven  without  a  heart, 

God  knows  he  leaves  behind  his  better  part. 

I  love  my  fellow-men  ;   the  worst  I  know 

I  would  do  good  to.     Will  death  change  me  so 

That  I  shall  sit  among  the  lazy  saints, 

Turning  a  deaf  ear  to  the  sore  complaints 

Of  souls  that  suffer  ?     Why,  I  never  yet 

Left  a  poor  dog  in  the  strada  hard  beset, 

Or  ass  o'erladen !     Must  I  rate  man  less 

Than  dog  or  ass,  in  holy  selfishness? 


56  THE   TENT   ON   THE   BEACH. 

Methinks  (Lord,  pardon,  if  the  thought  be  sin  !) 
The  world  of  pain  were  better,  if  therein 
One's  heart  might  still  be  human,  and  desires 
Of  natural  pity  drop  upon  its  fires 
Some  cooling  tears." 

Thereat  the  pale  monk  crossed 
His  brow,  and,  muttering,  "  Madman  !  thou  art  lost ! " 
Took  up  his  pyx  and  fled  ;   and,  left  alone, 
The  sick  man  closed  his  eyes  with  a  great  groan 
That  sank  into  a  prayer,  "  Thy  will  be  done  ! " 

Then  was  he  made  aware,  by  soul  or  ear, 
Of  somewhat  pure  and  holy  bending  o'er  him, 
And  of  a  voice  like  that  of  her  who  bore  him, 
Tender  and  most  compassionate  :    "  Never  fear  ! 
For  heaven  is  love,  as  God  himself  is  love  ; 
Thy  work  below  shall  be  thy  work  above." 
And  when  he  looked,  lo !  in  the  stern  monk's  place 
He  saw  the  shining  of  an  angel's  face  ! 


THE    CHANGELING.  $7 


The  Traveller  broke  the  pause.     "  I  Ve  seen 

The  Brothers  down  the  long  street  steal, 
Black,  silent,  masked,  the  crowd  between, 

And  felt  to  doff  my  hat  and  kneel 
With  heart,  if  not  with  knee,  in  prayer, 
For  blessings  on  their  pious  care." 
The  Reader  wiped  his  glasses  :   "  Friends  of  mine, 
We  '11  try  our  home-brewed  next,  instead  of  foreign 
wine." 


THE    CHANGELING. 

FOR  the  fairest  maid  in  Hampton 
They  needed  not  to  search, 

Who  saw  young  Anna  Favor 
Come  walking  into  church, — 
3* 


THE    TENT    ON    THE    BEACH. 

Or  bringing  from  the  meadows, 

At  set  of  harvest-day, 
The  frolic  of  the  blackbirds, 

The  sweetness  of  the  hay. 

Now  the  weariest  of  all  mothers, 
The  saddest  two-years  bride, 

She  scowls  in  the  face  of  her  husband, 
And  spurns  her  child  aside. 

"  Rake  out  the  red  coals,  goodman,  — 
For  there  the  child  shall  lie, 

Till  the  black  witch  comes  to  fetch  her, 
And  both  up  chimney  fly. 

"  It  's  never  my  own  little  daughter, 
It 's  never  my  own,"  she  said  ; 

"  The  witches  have  stolen  my  Anna, 
And  left  me  an  imp  instead. 


THE    CHANGELING.  59 

"O,  fair  and  sweet  was  my  baby, 

Blue  eyes,  and  hair  of  gold  ; 
But  this  is  ugly  and  wrinkled, 

Cross,  and  cunning,  and  old. 

"I  hate  the  touch  of  her  fingers, 

I  hate  the  feel  of  her  skin  ; 
It 's  not  the  milk  from  my  bosom, 

But  my  blood,  that  she  sucks  in. 

"  My  face  grows  sharp  with  the  torment ; 

Look !  my  arms  are  skin  and  bone  !  — 
Rake  open  the  red  coals,  goodman, 

And  the  witch  shall  have  her  own. 

"  She  '11  come  when  she  hears  it  crying, 

In  the  shape  of  an  owl  or  bat, 
And  she  '11  bring  us  our  darling  Anna 

In  place  of  her  screeching  brat." 


6O  THE   TENT    ON    THE   BEACH. 

Then  the  goodman,  Ezra  Dalton, 
Laid  his  hand  upon  her  head : 

"  Thy  sorrow  is  great,  O  woman ! 
I  sorrow  with  thee,"  he  said. 

"The  paths  to  trouble  are  many, 
And  never  but  one  sure  way 

Leads  out  to  the  light  beyond  it: 
My  poor  wife,  let  us  pray." 

Then  he  said  to  the  great  All-Father, 
"  Thy  daughter  is  weak  and  blind  ; 

Let  her  sight  come  back,  and  clothe  her 
Once  more  in  her  right  mind. 

"  Lead  her  out  of  this  evil  shadow, 

Out  of  these  fancies  wild  ; 
Let  the  holy  love  of  the  mother 

Turn  again  to  her  child. 


THE    CHANGELING.  6 1 

"  Make  her  lips  like  the  lips  of  Mary 

Kissing  her  blessed  Son  ; 
Let  her  hands,  like  the  hands  of  Jesus, 

Rest  on  her  little  one. 

"Comfort  the  soul  of  thy  handmaid, 

Open  her  prison-door, 
And  thine  shall  be  all  the  glory 

And  praise  forevermore." 

Then  into  the  face  of  its  mother 
The  baby  looked  up  and  smiled  ; 

And  the  cloud  of  her  soul  was  lifted, 
And  she  knew  her  little  child. 

A  beam  of  the  slant  west  sunshine 

Made  the  wan  face  almost  fair, 
Lit  the  blue  eyes'  patient  wonder, 

And  the  rings  of  pale  gold  hair. 


62  THE   TENT   ON   THE   BEACH. 

She  kissed  it  on  lip  and  forehead, 
She  kissed  it  on  cheek  and  chin, 

And  she  bared  her  snow-white  bosom 
To  the  lips  so  pale  and  thin. 

O,  fair  on  her  bridal  morning 

Was  the  maid  who  blushed  and  smiled, 
But  fairer  to  Ezra  Dalton 

Looked  the  mother  of  his  child. 

With  more  than  a  lover's  fondness 
He  stooped  to  her  worn  young  face, 

And  the  nursing  child  and  the  mother 
He  folded  in  one  embrace. 

"  Blessed  be  God  ! "  he  murmured. 

"  Blessed  be  God  !  "  she  said  ; 
"For  I  see,  who  once  was  blinded, — 

I  live,  who  once  was  dead. 


THE    CHANGELING.  63 

"Now  mount  and  ride,  my  goodman, 

As  thou  lovest  thy  own  soul ! 
Woe  's  me,  if  my  wicked  fancies 

Be  the  death  of  Goody  Cole ! " 

His  horse  he  saddled  and  bridled, 
And  into  the  night  rode  he,  — 

Now  through  the  great  black  woodland, 
Now  by  the  white-beached  sea. 

He  rode  through  the  silent  clearings, 

He  came  to  the  ferry  wide, 
And  thrice  he  called  to  the  boatman 

Asleep  on  the  other  side. 

He  set  his  horse  to  the  river, 

He  swam  to  Newbury  town, 
And  he  called  up  Justice  Sewall 

In  his  nightcap  and  his  gown. 


64  THE    TENT    ON    THE    BEACH. 

And  the  grave  and  worshipful  justice 
(Upon  whose  soul  be  peace  !) 

Set  his  name  to  the  jailer's  warrant 
For  Goodwife  Cole's  release. 

Then  through  the  night  the  hoof-beats 
Went  sounding  like  a  flail ; 

And  Goody  Cole  at  cockcrow 
Came  forth  from  Ipswich  jail. 


"  Here  is  a  rhyme  :  —  I  hardly  dare 

To  venture  on  its  theme  worn  out ; 
What  seems  so  sweet  by  Boon  and  Ayr 

Sounds  simply  silly  hereabout  ; 
And  pipes  by  lips  Arcadian  blown 
Are  only  tin  horns  at  our  own. 
Yet  still  the  muse  of  pastoral  walks  with  us, 
While  Hosea  Biglow  sings,  our  new  Theocritus." 


THE    MAIDS    OF    ATTITASH.  6$ 


THE   MAIDS   OF   ATTITASH. 

IN  sky  and  wave  the  white  clouds  swam, 
And  the  blue  hills  of  Nottingham 
Through  gaps  of  leafy  green 
Across  the  lake  were  seen,  — 

When,  in  the  shadow  of  the  ash 
That  dreams  its  dream  in  Attitash, 

In  the  warm  summer  weather, 

Two  maidens  sat  together. 

They  sat  and  watched  in  idle  mood 
The  gleam  and  shade  of  lake  and  wood,  - 

The  beach  the  keen  light  smote, 

The  white  sail  of  a  boat, — 


66  THE   TENT   ON   THE   BEACH. 

Swan  flocks  of  lilies  shoreward  lying, 
In  sweetness,  not  in  music,  dying,  — 
Hardback,  and  virgin' s-bower, 
And  white-spiked  clethra-flower. 

With  careless  ears  they  heard  the  plash 
And  breezy  wash  of  Attitash, 

The  wood-bird's  plaintive  cry, 

The  locust's  sharp  reply. 

And  teased  the  while,  with  playful  hand, 
The  shaggy  dog  of  Newfoundland, 

Whose  uncouth  frolic  spilled 

Their  baskets  berry-filled. 

Then  one,  the  beauty  of  whose  eyes 
Was  evermore  a  great  surprise, 
Tossed  back  her  queenly  head, 
And,  lightly  laughing,  said, — 


THE    MAIDS    OF    ATTITASH.  6/ 

"No  bridegroom's  hand  be  mine  to  hold 
That  is  not  lined  with  yellow  gold ; 

I  tread  no  cottage-floor ; 

I  own  no  lover  poor. 

"My  love  must  come  on  silken  wings, 
With  bridal  lights  of  diamond  rings, — 

Not  foul  with  kitchen  smirch, 

With  tallow-dip  for  torch." 

The  other,  on  whose  modest  head 
Was  lesser  dower  of  beauty  shed, 

With  look  for  Lome-hearths  meet, 

And  voice  exceeding  sweet, 

Answered,  — "  We  will  not  rivals  be  ; 
Take  thou  the  gold,  leave  love  to  me ; 

Mine  be  the  cottage  small, 

And  thine  ^he  rich  man's  hall. 


68  THE   TENT   ON    THE    BEACH. 

"  I  know,  indeed,  that  wealth  is  good  ; 

But  lowly  roof  and  simple  food, 
With  love  that  hath  no  doubt, 
Are  more  than  gold  without." 

Hard  by  a  farmer  hale  and  young 
His  cradle  in  the  rye -field  swung, 
Tracking  the  yellow  plain 
With  windrows  of  ripe  grain. 

And  still,  whene'er  he  paused  to  whet 
His  scythe,  the  sidelong  glance  he  met 
Of  large  dark  eyes,  where  strove 
False  pride  and  secret  love. 

Be  strong,  young  mower  of  the  grain  ; 
That  love  shall  overmatch  disdain, 

Its  instincts  soon  or  late 

The  heart  shall  vindicate. 


THE    MAIDS    OF   ATTITASH.  69 

In  blouse  of  gray,  with  fishing-rod, 
Half  screened  by  leaves,  a  stranger  trod 

The  margin  of  the  pond, 

Watching  the  group  beyond. 

The  supreme  hours  unnoted  come ; 

Unfelt  the  turning  tides  of  doom  ; 
And  so  the  maids  laughed  on, 
Nor  dreamed  what  Fate  had  done,  — 

Nor  knew  the  step  was  Destiny's 
That  rustled  in  the  birchen  trees, 

As,  with  their  lives  forecast, 

Fisher  and  mower  passed. 

Erelong  by  lake  and  rivulet  side 
The  summer  roses  paled  and  died, 

And  Autumn's  fingers  shed 

The  maple's  leaves  of  red. 


7O  THE   TENT    ON    THE   BEACH. 

Through  the  long  gold-hazed  afternoon, 
Alone,  but  for  the  diving  loon, 
The  partridge  in  the  brake, 
The  black  duck  on  the  lake, 

Beneath  the  shadow  of  the  ash 
Sat  man  and  maid  by  Attitash ; 
And  earth  and  air  made  room 
For  human  hearts  to  bloom. 

Soft  spread  the  carpets  of  the  sod, 
And  scarlet-oak  and  golden-rod 

With  blushes  and  with  smiles 

Lit  up  the  forest  aisles. 

The  mellow  light  the  lake  aslant, 
The  pebbled  margin's  ripple-chant 
Attempered  and  low-toned, 
The  tender  mystery  owned. 


THE    MAIDS    OF   ATTITASH.  7 

And  through  the  dream  the  lovers  dreamed 
Sweet  sounds  stole  in  and  soft  lights  streamed ; 

The  sunshine  seemed  to  bless, 

The  air  was  a  caress. 

Not  she  who  lightly  laughed  is  there, 
With  scornful  toss  of  midnight  hair, 

Her  dark,  disdainful  eyes, 

And  proud  lip  worldly-wise. 

Her  haughty  vow  is  still  unsaid, 
But  all  she  dreamed  and  coveted 

Wears,  half  to  her  surprise, 

The  youthful  farmer's  guise  ! 

With  more  than  all  her  old-time  pride 
She  walks  the  rye -field  at  his  side, 

Careless  of  cot  or  hall, 

Since  love  transfigures  all. 


72  THE   TENT   ON    THE    BEACH. 

Rich  beyond  dreams,  the  vantage-ground 
Of  life  is  gained  ;   her  hands  have  found 

The  talisman  of  old 

That  changes  all  to  gold. 

While  she  who  could  for  love  dispense 
With  all  its  glittering  accidents, 
And  trust  her  heart  alone, 
Finds  love  and  gold  her  own. 

What  wealth  can  buy  or  art  can  build 
Awaits  her ;  but  her  cup  is  filled 

Even  now  unto  the  brim  ; 

Her  world  is  love  and  him ! 


THE    TENT    ON    THE   BEACH.  73 

The  while  he  heard,  the  Book-man  drew 

A  length  of  make-believing  face, 
With  smothered  mischief  laughing  through : 

"  Why,  you  shall  sit  in  Ramsay's  place, 
And,  with  his  Gentle  Shepherd,  keep 
On  Yankee  hills  immortal  sheep, 
While  love-lorn  swains  and  maids  the  seas  beyond 
Hold  dreamy  tryst  around  your  huckleberry-pond." 

The  Traveller  laughed  :   "  Sir  Galahad 
Singing  of  love  the  Trouvere's  lay  ! 
How  should  he  know  the  blindfold  lad 

From  one  of  Vulcan's  forge-boys  ?  "  —  "  Nay, 
He  better  sees  who  stands  outside 
Than  they  who  in  procession  ride," 
The  Reader  answered  :    "  Selectmen  and  squire 
Miss,  while  they  make,  the  show  that  wayside  folks 
admire. 


74  THE   TENT    ON    THE    BEACH. 

"  Here  is  a  wild  tale  of  the  North, 

Our  travelled  friend  will  own  as  one 
Fit  for  a  Norland  Christmas  hearth 

And  lips  of  Christian  Andersen. 
They  tell  it  in  the  valleys  green 
Of  the  fair  island  he  has  seen, 
Low  lying  off  the  pleasant  Swedish  shore, 
Washed  by  the  Baltic  Sea,  and  watched  by  Elsinore." 


KALLUNDBORG    CHURCH. 


"  Tie  stille,  barn  min  ! 
Imorgen  kommer  Fin, 
Fa'er  din, 
Og  gi'er  dig  Esbern  Snares  bine  og  hjerte  at  lege  med  ! " 

Zealand  Rhyme. 


"  BUILD  at  Kallundborg  by  the  sea 
A  church  as  stately  as  church  may  be, 
And  there  shalt  thou  wed  my  daughter  fair," 
Said  the  Lord  of  Nesvek  to  Esbern  Snare. 


KALLUNDBORG    CHURCH.  75 

And  the  Baron  laughed.     But  Esbern  said, 
"  Though  I  lose  my  soul,  I  will  Helva  wed  ! " 
And  off  he  strode,  in  his  pride  of  will, 
To  the  Troll  who  dwelt  in  Ulshoi  hill. 

"  Build,  O  Troll,  a  church  for  me 
At  Kallundborg  by  the  mighty  sea; 
Build  it  stately,  and  build  it  fair, 
Build  it  quickly,"  said  Esbern  Snare. 

But  the  sly  Dwarf  said,  "No  work  is  wrought 
By  Trolls  of  the  Hills,  O  man,  for  naught. 
What  wilt  thou  give  for  thy  church  so  fair?" 
"  Set  thy  own  price,"  quoth  Esbern  Snare. 

"When  Kallundborg  church  is  builded  well, 
Thou  must  the  name  of  its  builder  tell, 
Or  thy  heart  and  thy  eyes  must  be  my  boon." 
"Build,"  said  Esbern,  "and  build  it  soon." 


76  THE    TENT    ON    THE    BEACH. 

By  night  and  by  day  the  Troll  wrought  on  ; 
He  hewed  the  timbers,  he  piled  the  stone  ; 
But  day  by  day,  as  the  walls  rose  fair, 
Darker  and  sadder  grew  Esbern  Snare. 

He  listened  by  night,  he  watched  by  day, 
He  sought  and  thought,  but  he  dared  not  pray  ; 
In  vain  he  called  on  the  Elle-maids  shy, 
And  the  Neck  and  the  Nis  gave  no  reply. 

Of  his  evil  bargain  far  and  wide 
A  rumor  ran  through  the  country-side ; 
And  Helva  of  Nesvek,  young  and  fair, 
Prayed  for  the  soul  of  Esbern  Snare. 

And  now  the  church  was  wellnigh  done ; 
One  pillar  it  lacked,  and  one  alone ; 
And  the  grim  Troll  muttered,  "  Fool  thou  art ! 
To-morrow  gives  me  thy  eyes  and  heart !  " 


KALLUNDBORG   CHURCH.  77 

By  Kallundborg  in  black  despair, 
Through  wood  and  meadow,  walked  Esbern  Snare, 
Till,  worn  and  weary,  the  strong  man  sank 
Under  the  birches  on  Ulshoi  bank. 

At  his  last  day's  work  he  heard  the  Troll 
Hammer  and  delve  in  the  quarry's  hole  ; 
Before  him  the  church  stood  large  and  fair: 
"  I  have  builded  my  tomb,"  said  Esbern  Snare. 

And  he  closed  his  eyes  the  sight  to  hide, 
When  he  heard  a  light  step  at  his  side  : 
"  O  Esbern  Snare  ! "  a  sweet  voice  said, 
"  Would  I  might  die  now  in  thy  stead  !  " 

With  a  grasp  by  love  and  by  fear  made  strong, 
He  held  her  fast,  and  he  held  her  long  ; 
With  the  beating  heart  of  a  bird  afeard, 
She  hid  her  face  in  his  flame-red  beard. 


THE   TENT   ON    THE    BEACH. 

"  O  love  ! "  he  cried,  "  let  me  look  to-day 
In  thine  eyes  ere  mine  are  plucked  away ; 
Let  me  hold  thee  close,  let  me  feel  thy  heart 
Ere  mine  by  the  Troll  is  torn  apart ! 

"  I  sinned,  O  Helva,  for  love  of  thee  ! 
Pray  that  the  Lord  Christ  pardon  me  ! " 
But  fast  as  she  prayed,  and  faster  still, 
Hammered  the  Troll  in  Ulshoi  hill. 

He  knew,  as  he  wrought,  that  a  loving  heart 

Was  somehow  baffling  his  evil  art ; 

For  more  than  spell  of  Elf  or  Troll 

Is  a  maiden's  prayer  for  her  lover's  soul. 

And  Esbern  listened,  and  caught  the  sound 
Of  a  Troll-wife  singing  underground  : 
"  To-morrow  comes  Fine,  father  thine  : 
Lie  still  and  hush  thee,  baby  mine ! 


KALLUNDBORG   CHURCH.  79 

"  Lie  still,  my  darling  !   next  sunrise 
Thou  'It  play  with  Esbern  Snare's  heart  and  eyes ! " 
"  Ho  !  ho  ! "   quoth  Esbern,  "  is  that  your  game  ? 
Thanks  to  the  Troll-wife,  I  know  his  name  ! " 

The  Troll  he  heard  him,  and  hurried  on 
To  Kallundborg  church  with  the  lacking  stone. 
"  Too  late,  Gaffer  Fine  ! "   cried  Esbern  Snare  ; 
And  Troll  and  pillar  vanished  in  air  ! 

That  night  the  harvesters  heard  the  sound 
Of  a  woman  sobbing  underground, 
And  the  voice  of  the  Hill-Troll  loud  with  blame 
Of  the  careless  singer  who  told  his  name. 

Of  the  Troll  of  the  Church  they  sing  the  rune 
By  the  Northern  Sea  in  the  harvest  moon  ; 
And  the  fishers  of  Zealand  hear  him  still 
Scolding  his  wife  in  Ulshoi  hill. 


8O  THE   TENT    ON   THE   BEACH. 

And  seaward  over  its  groves  of  birch 
Still  looks  the  tower  of  Kallundborg  church, 
Where,  first  at  its  altar,  a  wedded  pair, 
Stood  Helva  of  Nesvek  and  Esbern  Snare  ! 


"What,"  asked  the  Traveller,  "would  our  sires, 

The  old  Norse  story-tellers,  say 
Of  sun-graved  pictures,  ocean  wires, 

And  smoking  steamboats  of  to-day  ? 
And  this,  O,  lady,  by  your  leave, 
Recalls  your  song  of  yester  eve  : 
Pray,  let  us  have  that  Cable-hymn  once  more." 
"  Hear,  hear  ! "   the  Book-man  cried,  "  the  lady  has 
the  floor. 


THE   TENT   ON   THE    BEACH.  8 1 

"  These  noisy  waves  below  perhaps 

To  such  a  strain  will  lend  their  ear, 
With  softer  voice  and  lighter  lapse 

Come  stealing  up  the  sands  to  hear, 
And  what  they  once  refused  to  do 
For  old  King  Knut  accord  to  you. 
Nay,  even  the  fishes  shall  your  listeners  be, 
As  once,  the  legend  runs,  they  heard  St.  Anthony." 

O  lonely  bay  of  Trinity, 

O  dreary  shores,  give  ear! 
Lean  down  unto  the  white-lipped  sea 

The  voice  of  God  to  hear ! 

From  world  to  world  his  couriers  fly, 
Thought-winged  and  shod  with  fire  ; 

The  angel  of  His  stormy  sky 
Rides  down  the  sunken  wire. 

4*  F 


82  THE   TENT    ON   THE   BEACH. 

What  saith  the  herald  of  the  Lord  ? 

"  The  world's  long  strife  is  done  ; 
Close  wedded  by  that  mystic  cord, 

Its  continents  are  one. 

"  And  one  in  heart,  as  one  in  blood, 

Shall  all  her  peoples  be  ; 
The  hands  of  human  brotherhood 

Are  clasped  beneath  the  sea. 

"  Through  Orient  seas,  o'er  Afric's  plain 

And  Asian  mountains  borne, 
The  vigor  of  the  Northern  brain 

Shall  nerve  the  world  outworn. 

"  From  clime  to  clime,  from  shore  to  shore, 
Shall  thrill  the  magic  thread  ; 

The  new  Prometheus  steals  once  more 
The  fire  that  wakes  the  dead." 


THE   TENT    ON    THE    BEACH.  83 

Throb  on,  strong  pulse  of  thunder  !   beat 
From  answering  beach  to  beach ; 

Fuse  nations  in  thy  kindly  heat, 
And  melt  the  chains  of  each  ! 

Wild  terror  of  the  sky  above, 

Glide  tamed  and  dumb  below ! 
Bear  gently,  Ocean's  carrier-dove, 

Thy  errands  to  and  fro. 

Weave  on,  swift  shuttle  of  the  Lord, 

Beneath  the  deep  so  far, 
The  bridal  robe  of  earth's  accord, 

The  funeral  shroud  of  war ! 

For  lo  !   the  fall  of  Ocean's  wall 

Space  mocked  and  time  outrun ; 
And  round  the  world  the  thought  of  all 

Is  as  the  thought  of  one  ! 


84  THE   TENT    ON    THE   BEACH. 

The  poles  unite,  the  zones  agree, 
The  tongues  of  striving  cease ; 

As  on  the  Sea  of  Galilee 

The  Christ  is  whispering,  Peace ! 


"  Glad  prophecy  !   to  this  at  last," 

The  Reader  said,  "shall  all  things  come. 
Forgotten  be  the  bugle's  blast, 

And  battle-music  of  the  drum. 
A  little  while  the  world  may  run 
Its  old  mad  way,  with  needle-gun 
And  iron-clad,  but  truth,  at  last,  shall  reign  : 
The    cradle-song    of    Christ    was    never    sung    in 
vain ! " 


THE   DEAD    SHIP    OF   HARPS  WELL.  8$ 

Shifting  his  scattered  papers,  "  Here," 

He  said,  as  died  the  faint  applause, 

"  Is  something  that  I  found  last  year 

Down  on  the  island  known  as  Orr's. 
I  had  it  from  a  fair-haired  girl 
Who,  oddly,  bore  the  name  of  Pearl, 
(As  if  by  some  droll  freak  of  circumstance,) 
Classic,  or  wellnigh  so,  in  Harriet  Stowe's  romance." 

THE   DEAD   SHIP   OF   HARPSWELL. 

WHAT  flecks  the  outer  gray  beyond 

The  sundown's  golden  trail  ? 
The  white  flash  of  a  sea-bird's  wing, 

Or  gleam  of  slanting  sail  ? 
Let  young  eyes  watch  from  Neck  and  Point, 

And  sea-worn  elders  pray,  — 
The  ghost  of  what  was  once  a  ship 

Is  sailing  up  the  bay ! 


86  THE   TENT    ON    THE   BEACH. 

From  gray  sea-fog,  from  icy  drift, 

From  peril  and  from  pain, 
The  home-bound  fisher  greets  thy  lights, 

O  hundred-harbored  Maine  ! 
But  many  a  keel  shall  seaward  turn, 

And  many  a  sail  outstand, 
When,  tall  and  white,  the  Dead  Ship  looms 

Against  the  dusk  of  land. 


She  rounds  the  headland's  bristling  pines; 

She  threads  the  isle-set  bay  ; 
No  spur  of  breeze  can  speed  her  on, 

Nor  ebb  of  tide  delay. 
Old  men  still  walk  the  Isle  of  Orr 

Who  tell  her  date  and  name, 
Old  shipwrights  sit  in  Freeport  yards 

Who  hewed  her  oaken  frame. 


THE  DEAD  SHIP  OF  HARPSWELL.         8/ 

What  weary  doom  of  baffled  quest, 

Thou  sad  sea-ghost,  is  thine  ? 
What  makes  thee  in  the  haunts  of  home 

A  wonder  and  a  sign  ? 
No  foot  is  on  thy  silent  deck, 

Upon  thy  helm  no  hand  ; 
No  ripple  hath  the  soundless  wind 

That  smites  thee  from  the  land  ! 


For  never  comes  the  ship  to  port, 

Howe'er  the  breeze  may  be  ; 
Just  when  she  nears  the  waiting  shore 

She  drifts  again  to  sea. 
No  tack  of  sail,  nor  turn  of  helm, 

Nor  sheer  of  veering  side ; 
Stern-fore  she  drives  to  sea  and  night, 

Against  the  wind  and  tide. 


THE   TENT    ON   THE   BEACH. 

In  vain  o'er  Harpswell  Neck  the  star 

Of  evening  guides  her  in  ; 
In  vain  for  her  the  lamps  are  lit 

Within  thy  tower,  Seguin  ! 
In  vain  the  harbor-boat  shall  hail, 

In  vain  the  pilot  call ; 
No  hand  shall  reef  her  spectral  sail, 

Or  let  her  anchor  fall. 


Shake,  brown  old  wives,  with  dreary  joy, 

Your  gray-head  hints  of  ill ; 
And,  over  sick-beds  whispering  low, 

Your  prophecies  fulfil. 
Some  home  amid  yon  birchen  trees 

Shall  drape  its  door  with  woe  ; 
And  slowly  where  the  Dead  Ship  sails, 

The  burial  boat  shall  row ! 


THE    DEAD    SHIP    OF    HARPSWELL.  89 

From  Wolf  Neck  and  from  Flying  Point, 

From  island  and  from  main, 
From  sheltered  cove  and  tided  creek, 

Shall  glide  the  funeral  train. 
The  dead-boat  with  the  bearers  four, 

The  mourners  at  her  stern,  — 
And  one  shall  go  the  silent  way 

Who  shall  no  more  return  ! 


And  men  shall  sigh,  and  women  weep, 

Whose  dear  ones  pale  and  pine, 
And  sadly  over  sunset  seas 

Await  the  ghostly  sign. 
They  know  not  that  its  sails  are  filled 

By  pity's  tender  breath, 
Nor  see  the  Angel  at  the  helm 

Who  steers  the  Ship  of  Death  ! 


90  THE   TENT   ON   THE   BEACH. 


"  Chill  as  a  down-east  breeze  should  be," 
The  Book-man  said.     "  A  ghostly  touch 

The  legend  has.     I  'm  glad  to  see 
Your  flying  Yankee  beat  the  Dutch." 

"  Well,  here  is  something  of  the  sort 

Which  one  midsummer  day  I  caught 

• 

In  Narraganset  Bay,  for  lack  of  fish." 
"  We  wait,"  the  Traveller  said  ;   "  serve  hot  or  cold 
your  dish." 


THE   PALATINE. 


LEAGUES  north,  as  fly  the  gull  and  auk, 
Point  Judith  watches  with  eye  of  hawk  ; 
Leagues  south,  thy  beacon  flames,  Montauk ! 


THE    PALATINE.  9 1 

Lonely  and  wind-shorn,  wood-forsaken, 
With  never  a  tree  for  Spring  to  waken, 
For  tryst  of  lovers  or  farewells  taken, 

Circled  by  waters  that  never  freeze, 
Beaten  by  billow  and  swept  by  breeze, 
Lieth  the  island  of  Manisees, 

Set  at  the  mouth  of  the  Sound  to  hold 
The  coast  lights  up  on  its  turret  old, 
Yellow  with  moss  and  sea-fog  mould. 

Dreary  the  land  when  gust  and  sleet 
At  its  doors  and  windows  howl  and  beat, 
And  Winter  laughs  at  its  fires  of  peat ! 

But  in  summer  time,  when  pool  and  pond, 

Held  in  the  laps  of  valleys  fond, 

Are  blue  as  the  glimpses  of  sea  beyond  ; 


92  THE   TENT   ON    THE   BEACH. 


When  the  hills  are  sweet  with  the  brier-rose, 
And,  hid  in  the  warm,  soft  dells,  unclose 
Flowers  the  mainland  rarely  knows  ; 

When  boats  to  their  morning  fishing  go, 
And,  held  to  the  wind  and  slanting  low, 
Whitening  and  darkening  the  small  sails  show,  — 

Then  is  that  lonely  island  fair  ; 

And  the  pale  health-seeker  findeth  there 

The  wine  of  life  in  its  pleasant  air. 


No  greener  valleys  the  sun  invite, 

On  smoother  beaches  no  sea-birds  light, 

No  blue  waves  shatter  to  foam  more  white  ! 

There,  circling  ever  their  narrow  range, 

Quaint  tradition  and  legend  strange 

Live  on  unchallenged,  and  know  no  change. 


THE    PALATINE.  93 

Old  wives  spinning  their  webs  of  tow, 

Or  rocking  weirdly  to  and  fro 

In  and  out  of  the  peat's  dull  glow, 

And  old  men  mending  their  nets  of  twine, 
Talk  together  of  dream  and  sign, 
Talk  of  the  lost  ship  Palatine,  — 

The  ship  that,  a  hundred  years  before, 
Freighted  deep  with  its  goodly  store, 
In  the  gales  of  the  equinox  went  ashore. 

The  eager  islanders  one  by  one 

Counted  the  shots  of  her  signal  gun, 

And  heard  the  crash  when  she  drove  right  on  ! 

Into  the  teeth  of  death  she  sped  : 
(May  God  forgive  the  hands  that  fed 
The  false  lights  over  the  rocky  Head  !) 


94  THE   TENT    ON   THE   BEACH. 

O  men  and  brothers  !   what  sights  were  there  ! 
White  up-turned  faces,  hands  stretched  in  prayer 
Where  waves  had  pity,  could  ye  not  spare  ? 

Down  swooped  the  wreckers,  like  birds  of  prey 
Tearing  the  heart  of  the  ship  away, 
And  the  dead  had  never  a  word  to  say. 

And  then,  with  ghastly  shimmer  and  shine 
Over  the  rocks  and  the  seething  brine, 
They  burned  the  wreck  of  the  Palatine. 

In  their  cruel  hearts,  as  they  homeward  sped, 
"  The  sea  and  the  rocks  are  dumb,"  they  said  : 
"  There  '11  be  no  reckoning  with  the  dead." 

But  the  year  went  round,  and  when  once  more 
Along  their  foam-white  curves  of  shore 
They  heard  the  line-storm  rave  and  roar, 


THE    PALATINE.  95 

Behold !  again,  with  shimmer  and  shine, 
Over  the  rocks  and  the  seething  brine, 
The  flaming  wreck  of  the  Palatine ! 

So,  haply  in  fitter  words  than  these, 
Mending  their  nets  on  their  patient  knees 
They  tell  the  legend  of  Manisees. 

Nor  looks  nor  tones  a  doubt  betray  ; 

"  It  is  known  to  us  all,"  they  quietly  say  ; 

"We  too  have  seen  it  in  our  day." 

Is  there,  then,  no  death  for  a  word  once  spoken  ? 
Was  never  a  deed  but  left  its  token 
Written  on  tables  never  broken  ? 

Do  the  elements  subtle  reflections  give  ? 
Do  pictures  of  all  the  ages  live 
On  Nature's  infinite  negative, 


96  THE   TENT   ON   THE   BEACH. 

Which,  half  in  sport,  in  malice  half, 

She  shows  at  times,  with  shudder  or  laugh, 

Phantom  and  shadow  in  photograph  ? 

For  still,  on  many  a  moonless  night, 

From  Kingston  Head  and  from  Montauk  light 

The  spectre  kindles  and  burns  in  sight. 

Now  low  and  dim,  now  clear  and  higher, 
Leaps  up  the  terrible  Ghost  of  Fire, 
Then,  slowly  sinking,  the  flames  expire. 

And  the  wise  Sound  skippers,  though  skies  be  fine, 
Reef  their  sails  when  they  see  the  sign 
Of  the  blazing  wreck  of  the  Palatine  ! 


THE   TENT    ON    THE   BEACH.  97 

"A  fitter  tale  to  scream  than  sing," 

The  Book-man  said.     "  Well,  fancy,  then," 
The  Reader  answered,  "on  the  wing 

The  sea-birds  shriek  it,  not  for  men, 
But  in  the  ear  of  wave  and  breeze  ! " 
The  Traveller  mused  :  "  Your  Manisees 
Is  fairy-land  :  off  Narraganset  shore 
Who  ever  saw  the  isle  or  heard  its  name  before  ? 


"  'T  is  some  strange  land  of  Fly-away, 

Whose  dreamy  shore  the  ship  beguiles, 
St.  Brandan's  in  its  sea-mist  gray, 

Or  sunset  loom  of  Fortunate  Isles ! " 
"  No  ghost,  but  solid  turf  and  rock 
Is  the  good  island  known  as  Block," 
The  Reader  said.     "  For  beauty  and  for  ease 
I  chose  its  Indian  name,  soft-flowing  Manisees 
5  G 


98  THE   TENT   ON    THE   BEACH. 

"  But  let  it  pass  ;   here  is  a  bit 

Of  unrhymed  story,  with  a  hint 
Of  the  old  preaching  mood  in  it, 

The  sort  of  sidelong  moral  squint 
Our  friend  objects  to,  which  has  grown, 
I  fear,  a  habit  of  my  own. 

'T  was  written  when  the  Asian  plague  drew  near, 
And  the  land  held  its  breath  and  paled  with  sud- 
den fear." 


ABRAHAM    DAVENPORT. 

IN  the  old  days  (a  custom  laid  aside 

With  breeches  and  cocked  hats)  the  people  sent 

Their  wisest  men  to  make  the  public  laws. 

And  so,  from  a  brown  homestead,  where  the  Sound 

Drinks  the  small  tribute  of  the  Mianas, 


ABRAHAM   DAVENPORT.  99 

Waved  over  by  the  woods  of  Rippowams, 
And  hallowed  by  pure  lives  and  tranquil  deaths, 
Stamford  sent  up  to  the  councils  of  the  State 
Wisdom  and  grace  in  Abraham  Davenport. 

T  was  on  a  May-day  of  the  far  old  year 
Seventeen  hundred  eighty,  that  there  fell 
Over  the  bloom  and  sweet  life  of  the  Spring, 
Over  the  fresh  earth  and  the  heaven  of  noon, 
A  horror  of  great  darkness,  like  the  night 
In  day  of  which  the  Norland  sagas  tell,  — 
The  Twilight  of  the  Gods.     The  low-hung  sky 
Was  black  with  ominous  clouds,  save  where  its  rim 
Was  fringed  with  a  dull  glow,  like  that  which  climbs 
The  crater's  sides  from  the  red  hell  below. 
Birds  ceased  to  sing,  and  all  the  barn-yard  fowls 
Roosted ;   the  cattle  at  the  pasture  bars 
Lowed,  and  looked  homeward  ;  bats  on  leathern  wings 


IOO  THE  TENT  ON  THE  BEACH. 

Flitted  abroad  ;   the  sounds  of  labor  died ; 

Men  prayed,  and  women  wept ;  all  ears  grew  sharp 

To  hear  the  doom-blast  of  the  trumpet  shatter 

The  black  sky,  that  the  dreadful  face  of  Christ 

Might  look  from  the  rent  clouds,  not  as  he  looked 

A  loving  guest  at  Bethany,  but  stern 

As  Justice  and  inexorable  Law. 

Meanwhile  in  the  old  State-House,  dim  as  ghosts, 
Sat  the  lawgivers  of  Connecticut, 
Trembling  beneath  their  legislative  robes. 
"  It  is  the  Lord's  Great  Day  !     Let  us  adjourn," 
Some  said  ;   and  then,  as  if  with  one  accord, 
All  eyes  were  turned  to  Abraham  Davenport. 
He  rose,  slow  cleaving  with  his  steady  voice 
The  intolerable  hush.     "  This  well  may  be 
The  Day  of  Judgment  which  the  world  awaits  ; 
But  be  it  so  or  not,  I  only  know 


ABRAHAM   DAVENPORT.  IOI 

My  present  duty,  and  my  Lord's  command 

To  occupy  till  he  come.     So  at  the  post 

Where  he  hath  set  me  in  his  providence, 

I  choose,  for  one,  to  meet  him  face  to  face, — 

No  faithless  servant  frightened  from  my  task, 

But  ready  when  the  Lord  of  the  harvest  calls  ; 

And  therefore,  with  all  reverence,  I  would  say, 

Let  God  do  his  work,  we  will  see  to  ours. 

Bring  in  the  candles."    And  they  brought  them  in. 

Then  by  the  flaring  lights  the  Speaker  read, 
Albeit  with  husky  voice  and  shaking  hands, 
An  act  to  amend  an  act  to  regulate 
The  shad  and  alewive  fisheries.     Whereupon 
Wisely  and  well  spake  Abraham  Davenport, 
Straight  to  the  question,  with  no  figures  of  speech 
Save  the  ten  Arab  signs,  yet  not  without 
The  shrewd  dry  humor  natural  to  the  man  : 


IO2          THE  TENT  ON  THE  BEACH. 

His  awe-struck  colleagues  listening  all  the  while, 
Between  the  pauses  of  his  argument, 
To  hear  the  thunder  of  the  wrath  of  God 
Break  from  the  hollow  trumpet  of  the  cloud. 

And  there  he  stands  in  memory  to  this  day, 
Erect,  self-poised,  a  rugged  face,  half  seen 
Against  the  background  of  unnatural  dark, 
A  witness  to  the  ages  as  they  pass, 
That  simple  duty  hath  no  place  for  fear. 


He  ceased  :  just  then  the  ocean  seemed 
To  lift  a  half-faced  moon  in  sight ; 

And,  shoreward,  o'er  the  waters  gleamed, 
From  crest  to  crest,  a  line  of  light, 


THE    TENT    ON    THE    BEACH.  1 03 

Such  as  of  old,  with  solemn  awe, 

The  fishers  by  Gennesaret  saw, 
When  dry-shod  o'er  it  walked  the  Son  of  God, 
Tracking  the  waves  with  light  where'er  his  sandals 
trod. 

Silently  for  a  space  each  eye 

Upon  that  sudden  glory  turned  ; 
Cool  from  the  land  the  breeze  blew  by, 

The  tent-ropes  flapped,  the  long  beach  churned 
Its  waves  to  foam  ;   on  either  hand 
Stretched,  far  as  sight,  the  hills  of  sand  ; 
With  bays  of  marsh,  and  capes  of  bush  and  tree, 
The    wood's   black   shore-line    loomed    beyond    the 
meadowy  sea. 

The  lady  rose  to  leave.     "One  song, 

Or  hymn,"  they  urged,  "  before  we  part." 


IO4          THE  TENT  ON  THE  BEACH. 

And  she,  with  lips  to  which  belong 

Sweet  intuitions  of  all  art, 
Gave  to  the  winds  of  night  a  strain 
Which  they  who  heard  would  hear  again  ; 
And  to  her  voice  the  solemn  ocean  lent, 
Touching  its  harp  of  sand,  a  deep  accompaniment. 


The  harp  at  Nature's  advent  strung 

Has  never  ceased  to  play  ; 
The  song  the  stars  of  morning  sung 

Has  never  died  away. 

And  prayer  is  made,  and  praise  is  given, 

By  all  things  near  and  far : 
The  ocean  looketh  up  to  heaven, 

And  mirrors  every  star. 


THE  TENT  ON  THE  BEACH.          10$ 

Its  waves  are  kneeling  on  the  strand, 

As  kneels  the  human  knee, 
Their  white  locks  bowing  to  the  sand, 

The  priesthood  of  the  sea  ! 

They  pour  their  glittering  treasures  forth, 

Their  gifts  of  pearl  they  bring, 
And  all  the  listening  hills  of  earth 

Take  up  the  song  they  sing. 

The  green  earth  sends  her  incense  up 

From  many  a  mountain  shrine  ; 
From  folded  leaf  and  dewy  cup 

She  pours  her  sacred  wine. 

The  mists  above  the  morning  rills 

Rise  white  as  wings  of  prayer ; 
The  altar  curtains  of  the  hills 

Are  sunset's  purple  air. 
5* 


IO6          THE  TENT  ON  THE  BEACH. 

The  winds  with  hymns  of  praise  are  loud, 
Or  low  with  sobs  of  pain,  — 

The  thunder-organ  of  the  cloud, 
The  dropping  tears  of  rain. 

With  drooping  head  and  branches  crossed 

The  twilight  forest  grieves, 
Or  speaks  with  tongues  of  Pentecost 

From  all  its  sunlit  leaves. 

The  blue  sky  is  the  temple's  arch, 

Its  transept  earth  and  air, 
The  music  of  its  starry  march 

The  chorus  of  a  prayer. 

So  Nature  keeps  the  reverent  frame 
With  which  her  years  began, 

And  all  her  signs  and  voices  shame 
The  prayerless  heart  of  man. 


THE  TENT  ON  THE  BEACH.  IO/ 

The  singer  ceased.     The  moon's  white  rays 

Fell  on  the  rapt,  still  face  of  her. 
"Allah  il  Allah!     He  hath  praise 

From  all  things,"  said  the  Traveller. 
"  Oft  from  the  desert's  silent  nights, 
And  mountain  hymns  of  sunset  lights, 
My  heart  has  felt  rebuke,  as  in  his  tent 
The  Moslem's  prayer  has  shamed  my  Christian  knee 
unbent." 

He  paused,  and  lo !  far,  faint,  and  slow 

The  bells  in  Newbury's  steeples  tolled 
The  twelve  dead  hours ;   the  lamp  burned  low ; 

The  singer  sought  her  canvas  fold. 
One  sadly  said,  "At  break  of  day 
We  strike  our  tent  and  go  our  way." 
But  one  made  answer  cheerily,  "Never  fear, 
We  '11  pitch  this  tent  of  ours  in  type  another  year." 


NATIONAL     LYRICS. 


THE   MANTLE   OF   ST.   JOHN   DE   MATHA. 

A  LEGEND  OF  "THE  RED,  WHITE,  AND  BLUE,"  A.  D.  1154-1864. 

A  STRONG  and  mighty  Angel, 

Calm,  terrible,  and  bright, 
The  cross  in  blended  red  and  blue 

Upon  his  mantle  white  ! 

Two  captives  by  him  kneeling, 

Each  on  his  broken  chain, 
Sang  praise  to  God  who  raiseth 

The  dead  to  life  again  ! 

Dropping  his  cross-wrought  mantle, 

"  Wear  this,"  the  Angel  said  ; 
"Take  thou,  O  Freedom's  priest,  its  sign, — 

The  white,  the  blue,  and  red." 


112  NATIONAL   LYRICS. 

Then  rose  up  John  de  Matha 

In  the  strength  the  Lord  Christ  gave, 

And  begged  through  all  the  land  of  France 
The  ransom  of  the  slave. 

The  gates  of  tower  and  castle 

Before  him  open  flew, 
The  drawbridge  at  his  coming  fell, 

The  door-bolt  backward  drew. 

For  all  men  owned  his  errand, 

And  paid  his  righteous  tax  ; 
And  the  hearts  of  lord  and  peasant 

Were  in  his  hands  as  wax. 

At  last,  outbound  from  Tunis, 

His  bark  her  anchor  weighed, 
Freighted  with  seven  score  Christian  souls 

Whose  ransom  he  had  paid. 


THE   MANTLE    OF    ST.   JOHN    DE    MATHA.  113 

But,  torn  by  Paynim  hatred, 

Her  sails  in  tatters  hung  ; 
And  on  the  wild  waves,  rudderless, 

A  shattered  hulk  she  swung. 

"  God  save  us  ! "  cried  the  captain, 

"  For  naught  can  man  avail : 
O,  woe  betide  the  ship  that  lacks 

Her  rudder  and  her  sail ! 

"  Behind  us  are  the  Moormen  ; 

At  sea  we  sink  or  strand  : 
There  's  death  upon  the  water, 

There  's  death  upon  the  land  !  "* 

Then  up  spake  John  de  Matha : 

"  God's  errands  never  fail ! 
Take  thou  the  mantle  which  I  wear, 

And  make  of  it  a  sail." 

H 


114  NATIONAL   LYRICS. 

They  raised  the  cross-wrought  mantle, 

The  blue,  the  white,  the  red  ; 
And  straight  before  the  wind  off-shore 

The  ship  of  Freedom  sped. 

. 
"  God  help  us  ! "  cried  the  seamen, 

"  For  vain  is  mortal  skill : 
The  good  ship  on  a  stormy  sea 

Is  drifting  at  its  will." 

Then  up  spake  John  de  Matha : 

"  My  mariners,  never  fear  ! 
The  Lord  whose  breath  has  filled  her  sail 

May  well  our  vessel  steer  ! " 

So  on  through  storm  and  darkness 
They  drove  for  weary  hours  ; 

And  lo  !   the  third  gray  morning  shone 
On  Ostia's  friendly  towers. 


THE    MANTLE    OF    ST.   JOHN    DE    MATHA.  1 15 

And  on  the  walls  the  watchers 

The  ship  of  mercy  knew,  — 
They  knew  far  off  its  holy  cross, 

The  red,  the  white,  and  blue. 

And  the  bells  in  all  the  steeples 

Rang  out  in  glad  accord, 
To  welcome  home  to  Christian  soil 

The  ransomed  of  the  Lord. 

So  runs  the  ancient  legend 

By  bard  and  painter  told  ; 
And  lo  !  the  cycle  rounds  again, 

The  new  is  as  the  old ! 

With  rudder  foully  broken, 

And  sails  by  traitors  torn, 
Our  country  on  a  midnight  sea 

Is  waiting  for  the  morn. 


Il6  NATIONAL   LYRICS. 

Before  her,  nameless  terror ; 

Behind,  the  pirate  foe  ; 
The  clouds  are  black  above  her, 

The  sea  is  white  below. 

The  hope  of  all  who  suffer, 
The  dread  of  all  who  wrong, 

She  drifts  in  darkness  and  in  storm, 
How  long,  O  Lord  !  how  long  ? 

But  courage,  O  my  mariners  ! 

Ye  shall  not  suffer  wreck, 
While  up  to  God  the  freedman's  prayers 

Are  rising  from  your  deck. 

Is  not  your  sail  the  banner 
Which  God  hath  blest  anew, 

The  mantle  that  De  Matha  wore, 
The  red,  the  white,  the  blue  ? 


THE    MANTLE    OF    ST.   JOHN    DE    MATHA. 

Its  hues  are  all  of  heaven, — 

The  red  of  sunset's  dye, 
The  whiteness  of  the  moon-lit  cloud, 

The  blue  of  morning's  sky. 

Wait  cheerily,  then,  O  mariners, 

For  daylight  and  for  land ; 
The  breath  of  God  is  in  your  sail, 

Your  rudder  is  His  hand. 

Sail  on,  sail  on,  deep-freighted 
With  blessings  and  with  hopes ; 

The  saints  of  old  with  shadowy  hands 
Are  pulling  at  your  ropes. 

Behind  ye  holy  martyrs 

Uplift  the  palm  and  crown  ; 

Before  ye  unborn  ages  send 
Their  benedictions  down. 


Il8  NATIONAL   LYRICS. 

Take  heart  from  John  de  Matha  !  — 

God's  errands  never  fail ! 
Sweep  on  through  storm  and  darkness, 

The  thunder  and  the  hail ! 

Sail  on !     The  morning  cometh, 
The  port  ye  yet  shall  win ; 

And  all  the  bells  of  God  shall  ring 
The  good  ship  bravely  in ! 


WHAT   THE   BIRDS    SAID.  1 1 9 


WHAT    THE    BIRDS    SAID. 

THE  birds  against  the  April  wind 

Flew  northward,  singing  as  they  flew  ; 

They  sang,  "  The  land  we  leave  behind 
Has  swords  for  corn-blades,  blood  for  dew." 

"O  wild-birds,  flying  from  the  South, 
What  saw  and  heard  ye,  gazing  down  ? " 

"We  saw  the  mortar's  upturned  mouth, 
The  sickened  camp,  the  blazing  town  ! 

"  Beneath  the  bivouac's  starry  lamps, 
We  saw  your  march-worn  children  die  ; 

In  shrouds  of  moss,  in  cypress  swamps, 
We  saw  your  dead  uncoffined  lie. 


I2O  NATIONAL    LYRICS. 

"We  heard  the  starving  prisoner's  sighs, 
And  saw,  from  line  and  trench,  your  sons 

Follow  our  flight  with  home-sick  eyes 
Beyond  the  battery's  smoking  guns." 

"And  heard  and  saw  ye  only  wrong 

And  pain,"  I  cried,  "  O  wing-worn  flocks  ? " 

"We  heard,"  they  sang,  "the  freedman's  song, 
The  crash  of  Slavery's  broken  locks  ! 

"We  saw  from  new,  uprising  States 
The  treason-nursing  mischief  spurned, 

As,  crowding  Freedom's  ample  gates, 
The  long-estranged  and  lost  returned. 

"  O'er  dusky  faces,  seamed  and  old, 
And  hands  horn-hard  with  unpaid  toil, 

With  hope  in  every  rustling  fold, 
We  saw  your  star-dropt  flag  uncoil. 


WHAT   THE   BIRDS    SAID.  121 

"And  struggling  up  through  sounds  accursed, 
A  grateful  murmur  clomb  the  air ; 

A  whisper  scarcely  heard  at  first, 

It  filled  the  listening  heavens  with  prayer. 

"And  sweet  and  far,  as  from  a  star, 
Replied  a  voice  which  shall  not  cease, 

Till,  drowning  all  the  noise  of  war, 
It  sings  the  blessed  song  of  peace  ! " 

So  to  me,  in  a  doubtful  day 

Of  chill  and  slowly  greening  spring, 

Low  stooping  from  the  cloudy  gray, 
The  wild-birds  sang  or  seemed  to  sing. 

They  vanished  in  the  misty  air, 

The  song  went  with  them  in  their  flight ; 
But  lo  !   they  left  the  sunset  fair, 

And  in  the  evening  there  was  light. 
6 


122  NATIONAL   LYRICS. 


LAUS   DEO! 

ON   HEARING  THE  BELLS   RING  ON  THE  PASSAGE  OF  THE  CONSTITU- 
TIONAL AMENDMENT  ABOLISHING  SLAVERY. 

IT  is  done  ! 

Clang  of  bell  and  roar  of  gun 
Send  the  tidings  up  and  down. 

How  the  belfries  rock  and  reel ! 

How  the  great  guns,  peal  on  peal, 
Fling  the  joy  from  town  to  town  ! 

Ring,  O  bells  ! 

Every  stroke  exulting  tells 
Of  the  burial  hour  of  crime. 

Loud  and  long,  that  all  may  hear, 

Ring  for  every  listening  ear 
Of  Eternity  and  Time  ! 


LAUS  DEO!  123 

Let  us  kneel  : 

God's  own  voice  is  in  that  peal, 
And  this  spot  is  holy  ground. 

Lord,  forgive  us !     What  are  we, 

That  our  eyes  this  glory  see, 
That  our  ears  have  heard  the  sound ! 


For  the  Lord 

On  the  whirlwind  is  abroad  ; 
In  the  earthquake  he  has  spoken  ; 

He  has  smitten  with  his  thunder 

The  iron  walls  asunder, 
And  the  gates  of  brass  are  broken ! 

Loud  and  long 
Lift  the  old  exulting  song; 
Sing  with  Miriam  by  the  sea 


124  NATIONAL   LYRICS. 

He  has  cast  the  mighty  down  ; 
Horse  and  rider  sink  and  drown  ; 
"  He  hath  triumphed  gloriously  ! " 


Did  we  dare, 

In  our  agony  of  prayer, 
Ask  for  more  than  He  has  done  ? 

When  was  ever  his  right  hand 

Over  any  time  or  land 
Stretched  as  now  beneath  the  sun  ? 


How  they  pale, 
Ancient  myth  and  song  and  tale, 

In  this  wonder  of  our  days, 
When  the  cruel  rod  of  war 
Blossoms  white  with  righteous  law, 

And  the  wrath  of  man  is  praise  ! 


LAUS    DEO !  125 


Blotted  out! 
All  within  and  all  about 

Shall  a  fresher  life  begin  ; 
Freer  breathe  the  universe 
As  it  rolls  its  heavy  curse 

On  the  dead  and  buried  sin ! 


It  is  done ! 
In  the  circuit  of  the  sun 

Shall  the  sound  thereof  go  forth. 
It  shall  bid  the  sad  rejoice, 
It  shall  give  the  dumb  a  voice, 

It  shall  belt  with  joy  the  earth! 

Ring  and  swing, 

Bells  of  joy  !     On  morning's  wing 
Send  the  song  of  praise  abroad  ! 


126  NATIONAL    LYRICS. 

With  a  sound  of  broken  chains 
Tell  the  nations  that  He  reigns, 
Who  alone  is  Lord  and  God  ! 


THE    PEACE   AUTUMN.  I2/ 


THE   PEACE  AUTUMN. 

WRITTEN    FOR   THE    ESSEX    COUNTY   AGRICULTURAL    FESTIVAL, 
1865. 

THANK  God  for  rest,  where  none  molest, 

And  none  can  make  afraid, — 
For  Peace  that  sits  as  Plenty's  guest 

Beneath  the  homestead  shade  ! 

Bring  pike  and  gun,  the  sword's  red  scourge, 

The  negro's  broken  chains, 
And  beat  them  at  the  blacksmith's  forge 

To  ploughshares  for  our  plains. 

Alike  henceforth  our  hills  of  snow, 
And  vales  where  cotton  flowers  ; 

All  streams  that  flow,  all  winds  that  blow 
Are  Freedom's  motive-powers. 


128  NATIONAL   LYRICS. 

Henceforth  to  Labor's  chivalry 

Be  knightly  honors  paid  ; 
For  nobler  than  the  sword's  shall  be 

The  sickle's  accolade. 

Build  up  an  altar  to  the  Lord, 
O  grateful  hearts  of  ours  ! 

And  shape  it  of  the  greenest  sward 
That  ever  drank  the  showers. 

Lay  all  the  bloom  of  gardens  there, 
And  there  the  orchard  fruits  ; 

Bring  golden  grain  from  sun  and  air, 
From  earth  her  goodly  roots. 

There  let  our  banners  droop  and  flow, 
The  stars  uprise  and  fall  ; 

Our  roll  of  martyrs,  sad  and  slow, 
Let  sighing  breezes  call. 


THE   PEACE   AUTUMN. 

Their  names  let  hands  of  horn  and  tan 
And  rough-shod  feet  applaud, 

Who  died  to  make  the  slave  a  man, 
And  link  with  toil  reward. 

There  let  the  common  heart  keep  time 

To  such  an  anthem  sung 
As  never  swelled  on  poet's  rhyme, 

Or  thrilled  on  singer's  tongue. 

Song  of  our  burden  and  relief, 

Of  peace  and  long  annoy ; 
The  passion  of  our  mighty  grief 

And  our  exceeding  joy! 

A  song  of  praise  to  Him  who  filled 

The  harvests  sown  in  tears, 
And  gave  each  field  a  double  yield 

To  feed  our  battle-years  ! 
6* 


I3O  NATIONAL   LYRICS. 

A  song  of  faith  that  trusts  the  end 

To  match  the  good  begun, 
Nor  doubts  the  power  of  Love  to  blend 

The  hearts  of  men  as  one ! 


TO   THE   THIRTY-NINTH    CONGRESS. 


TO   THE  THIRTY-NINTH   CONGRESS. 

O  PEOPLE-CHOSEN!  are  ye  not 
Likewise  the  chosen  of  the  Lord, 
To  do  his  will  and  speak  his  word  ? 

From  the  loud  thunder-storm  of  war 
Not  man  alone  hath  called  ye  forth, 
But  he,  the  God  of  all  the  earth  ! 

The  torch  of  vengeance  in  your  hands 
He  quenches  ;   unto  Him  belongs 
The  solemn   recompense  of  wrongs. 

Enough  of  blood  the  land  has  seen, 
And  not  by  cell  or  gallows-stair 
Shall  ye  the  way  of  God  prepare. 


132  NATIONAL   LYRICS. 

Say  to  the  pardon-seekers,  —  Keep 
Your  manhood,  bend  no  suppliant  knees, 
Nor  palter  with  unworthy  pleas. 

Above  your  voices  sounds  the  wail 
Of  starving  men  ;   we  shut  in  vain 
Our  eyes  to  Pillow's  ghastly  stain. 

What  words  can  drown  that  bitter  cry? 
What  tears  wash  out  that  stain  of  death  ? 
What  oaths  confirm  your  broken  faith? 

From  you  alone  the  guaranty 

Of  union,  freedom,  peace,  we  claim  ; 
We  urge  no  conqueror's  terms  of  shame. 

Alas!   no  victor's  pride  is  ours; 
We  bend  above  our  triumphs  won 
Like  David  o'er  his  rebel  son. 


TO   THE   THIRTY-NINTH   CONGRESS.  133 

Be  men,  not  beggars.     Cancel  all 

By  one  brave,  generous  action ;   trust 
Your  better  instincts,  and  be  just! 

Make  all  men  peers  before  the  law, 

Take  hands  from  off  the  negro's  throat, 
Give  black  and  white  an  equal  vote. 

Keep  all  your  forfeit  lives  and  lands, 
But  give  the  common  law's  redress 
To  labor's  utter  nakedness. 

Revive  the  old  heroic  will ; 

Be  in  the  right  as  brave  and  strong 
As  ye  have  proved  yourselves  in  wrong. 

Defeat  shall  then  be  victory, 

Your  loss  the  wealth  of  full  amends, 
And  hate  be  love,  and  foes  be  friends. 


134  NATIONAL    LYRICS. 

Then  buried  be  the  dreadful  past, 

Its  common  slain  be  mourned,  and  let 
All  memories  soften  to  regret. 

Then  shall  the  Union's  mother-heart 
Her  lost  and  wandering  ones  recall, 
Forgiving  and  restoring  all,  — 

And  Freedom  break  her  marble  trance 
Above  the  Capitolian  dome, 
Stretch  hands,  and  bid  ye  welcome  home ! 


OCCASIONAL    POEMS. 


THE  ETERNAL  GOODNESS. 

0  FRIENDS!  with  whom  my  feet  have  trod 
The  quiet  aisles  of  prayer, 

Glad  witness  to  your  zeal  for  God 
And  love  of  man  I  bear. 

1  trace  your  lines  of  argument ; 
Your  logic  linked  and  strong 

I  weigh  as  one  who  dreads  dissent, 
And  fears  a  doubt  as  wrong. 

But  still  my  human  hands  are  weak 

To  hold  your  iron  creeds  ; 
Against  the  words  ye  bid  me  speak 

My  heart  within  me  pleads. 


138  THE  ETERNAL  GOODNESS. 

Who  fathoms  the  Eternal  Thought  ? 

Who  talks  of  scheme  and  plan  ? 
The  Lord  is  God  !     He  needeth  not 

The  poor  device  of  man. 

I  walk  with  bare,  hushed  feet  the  ground 
Ye  tread  with  boldness  shod  ; 

I  dare  not  fix  with  mete  and  bound 
The  love  and  power  of  God. 

Ye  praise  His  justice  ;  even  such 

His  pitying  love  I  deem  : 
Ye  seek  a  king  ;  I  fain  would  touch 

The  robe  that  hath  no  seam. 

Ye  see  the  curse  which  overbroods 

A  world  of  pain  and  loss  ; 
I  hear  our  Lord's  beatitudes 

And  prayer  upon  the  cross. 


THE  ETERNAL  GOODNESS.          139 

More  than  your  schoolmen  teach,  within 

Myself,  alas !  I  know  ; 
Too  dark  ye  cannot  paint  the  sin, 

Too  small  the  merit  show. 

I  bow  my  forehead  to  the  dust, 

I  veil  mine  eyes  for  shame, 
And  urge,  in  trembling  self-distrust, 

A  prayer  without  a  claim. 

I  see  the  wrong  that  round  me  lies, 

I  feel  the  guilt  within  ; 
I  hear,  with  groan  and  travail-cries, 

The  world  confess  its  sin. 

Yet,  in  the  maddening  maze  of  things, 

And  tossed  by  storm  and  flood, 
To  one  fixed  stake  my  spirit  clings  : 

I  know  that  God  is  good ! 


I4O  THE  ETERNAL  GOODNESS. 

Not  mine  to  look  where  cherubim 
And  seraphs  may  not  see, 

But  nothing  can  be  good  in  Him 
Which  evil  is  in  me. 

The  wrong  that  pains  my  soul  below 

I  dare  not  throne  above  : 
I  know  not  of  His  hate,  —  I  know 

His  goodness  and  His  love. 

I  dimly  guess  from  blessings  known 

Of  greater  out  of  sight, 
And,  with  the  chastened  Psalmist,  own 

His  judgments  too  are  right. 

I  long  for  household  voices  gone, 
For  vanished  smiles  I  long, 

But  God  hath  led  my  dear  ones  on, 
And  He  can  do  no  wrong. 


THE   ETERNAL    GOODNESS. 

I  know  not  what  the  future  hath 

Of  marvel  or  surprise, 
Assured  alone  that  life  and  death 

His  mercy  underlies. 

And  if  my  heart  and  flesh  are  weak 

To  bear  an  untried  pain, 
The  bruised  reed  He  will  not  break, 

But  strengthen  and  sustain. 

No  offering  of  my  own  I  have, 
Nor  works  my  faith  to  prove  ; 

I  can  but  give  the  gifts  He  gave, 
And  plead  His  love  for  love. 

And  so  beside  the  Silent  Sea 

I  wait  the  muffled  oar ; 
No  harm  from  Him  can  come  to  me 

On  ocean  or  on  shore. 


142  THE  ETERNAL  GOODNESS. 

I  know  not  where  His  islands  lift 
Their  fronded  palms  in  air ; 

I  only  know  I  cannot  drift 
Beyond  His  love  and  care. 

O  brothers !  if  my  faith  is  vain, 

If  hopes  like  these  betray, 
Pray  for  me  that  my  feet  may  gain 

The  sure  and  safer  way. 

And  Thou,  O  Lord  !  by  whom  are  seen 

Thy  creatures  as  they  be, 
Forgive  me  if  too  close  I  lean 

My  human  heart  on  Thee ! 


OUR   MASTER.  143 


OUR  MASTER. 

IMMORTAL  Love,  forever  full, 

Forever  flowing  free, 
Forever  shared,  forever  whole, 

A  never-ebbing  sea ! 

Our  outward  lips  confess  the  name 

All  other  names  above  ; 
Love  only  knoweth  whence  it  came, 

And  comprehendeth  love. 

Blow,  winds  of  God,  awake  and  blow 

The  mists  of  earth  away  ! 
Shine  out,  O  Light  Divine,  and  show 

How  wide  and  far  we  stray  ! 


144  OUR   MASTER. 

Hush  every  lip,  close  every  book, 
The  strife  of  tongues  forbear  ; 

Why  forward  reach,  or  backward  look, 
For  love  that  clasps  like  air  ? 

We  may  not  climb  the  heavenly  steeps 
To  bring  the  Lord  Christ  down  : 

In  vain  we  search  the  lowest  deeps, 
For  him  no  depths  can  drown. 

Nor  holy  bread,  nor  blood  of  grape, 

The  lineaments  restore 
Of  him  we  know  in  outward  shape 

And  in  the  flesh  no  more. 

He  cometh  not  a  king  to  reign  ; 

The  world's  long  hope  is  dim  ; 
The  weary  centuries  watch  in  vain 

The  clouds  of  heaven  for  him. 


OUR   MASTER.  145 

Death  comes,  life  goes  ;  the  asking  eye 

And  ear  are  answerless ; 
The  grave  is  dumb,  the  hollow  sky 

Is  sad  with  silentness. 

The  letter  fails,  and  systems  fall, 

And  every  symbol  wanes ; 
The  Spirit  over-brooding  all 

Eternal  Love  remains. 

And  not  for  signs  in  heaven  above 

Or  earth  below  they  look, 
Who  know  with  John  his  smile  of  love, 

With  Peter  his  rebuke. 

In  joy  of  inward  peace,  or  sense 

Of  sorrow  over  sin, 
He  is  his  own  best  evidence, 

His  witness  is  within. 

7  J 


OUR   MASTER. 

No  fable  old,  nor  mythic  lore, 

Nor  dream  of  bards  and  seers, 
No  dead  fact  stranded  on  the  shore 

Of  the  oblivious  years  ;  — 

But  warm,  sweet,  tender,  even  yet 

A  present  help  is  he ; 
And  faith  has  still  its  Olivet, 

And  love  its  Galilee. 

The  healing  of  his  seamless  dress 

Is  by  our  beds  of  pain  ; 
We  touch  him  in  life's  throng  and  press, 

And  we  are  whole  again. 

Through  him  the  first  fond  prayers  are  said 

Our  lips  of  childhood  frame, 
The  last  low  whispers  of  our  dead 

Are  burdened  with  his  name. 


OUR   MASTER.  147 

O  Lord  and  Master  of  us  all ! 

Whate'er  our  name  or  sign, 
We  own  thy  sway,  we  hear  thy  call, 

We  test  our  lives  by  thine. 

Thou  judgest  us ;   thy  purity 

Doth  all  our  lusts  condemn  ; 
The  love  that  draws  us  nearer  thee 

Is  hot  with  wrath  to  them. 

Our  thoughts  lie  open  to  thy  sight ; 

And,  naked  to  thy  glance, 
Our  secret  sins  are  in  the  light 

Of  thy  pure  countenance. 

Thy  healing  pains,  a  keen  distress 

Thy  tender  light  shines  in  ; 
Thy  sweetness  is  the  bitterness, 

Thy  grace  the  pang  of  sin. 


148  OUR   MASTER. 

Yet,  weak  and  blinded  though  we  be, 
Thou  dost  our  service  own  ; 

We  bring  our  varying  gifts  to  thee, 
And  thou  rejectest  none. 

To  thee  our  full  humanity, 
Its  joys  and  pains,  belong ; 

The  wrong  of  man  to  man  on  thee 
Inflicts  a  deeper  wrong. 

Who  hates  hates  thee,  who  loves  becomes 

Therein  to  thee  allied  ; 
All  sweet  accords  of  hearts  and  homes 

In  thee  are  multiplied. 

Deep  strike  thy  roots,  O  heavenly  Vine, 

Within  our  earthly  sod, 
Most  human  and  yet  most  divine, 

The  flower  of  man  and  God  ! 


OUR   MASTER.  149 

O   Love !    O   Life  !     Our  faith  and  sight 

Thy  presence  maketh  one  : 
As  through  transfigured  clouds  of  white 

We  trace  the  noon-day  sun. 

So,  to  our  mortal  eyes  subdued, 

Flesh-veiled,  but  not  concealed, 
We  know  in  thee  the  fatherhood 

And  heart  of  God  revealed. 

We  faintly  hear,  we  dimly  see, 

In  differing  phrase  we  pray  ; 
But,  dim  or  clear,  we  own  in  thee 

The  Light,  the  Truth,  the  Way! 

The  homage  that  we  render  thee 

Is  still  our  Father's  own  ; 
Nor  jealous  claim  or  rivalry 

Divides  the  Cross  and  Throne. 


I5O  OUR   MASTER. 

To  do  thy  will  is  more  than  praise, 
As  words  are  less  than  deeds, 

And  simple  trust  can  find  thy  ways 
We  miss  with  chart  of  creeds. 

No  pride  of  self  thy  service  hath, 
No  place  for  me  and  mine  ; 

Our  human  strength  is  weakness,  death 
Our  life,  apart  from  thine. 

Apart  from  thee  all  gain  is  loss, 

All  labor  vainly  done  ; 
The  solemn  shadow  of  thy  Cross 

Is  better  than  the  sun. 

Alone,  O  Love  ineffable  ! 

Thy  saving  name  is  given ; 
To  turn  aside  from   thee  is  hell, 

To  walk  with  thee  is  heaven  ! 


OUR   MASTER.  15 1 

How  vain,  secure  in  all  thou  art, 

Our  noisy  championship  !  — 
The  sighing  of  the  contrite  heart 

Is  more  than  flattering  lip. 

Not  thine  the  bigot's  partial  plea, 

Nor  thine  the  zealot's  ban  ; 
Thou  well  canst  spare  a  love  of  thee 

Which  ends  in  hate  of  man. 

Our  Friend,  our  Brother,  and  our  Lord, 

What  may  thy  service  be  ?  — 
Nor  name,  nor  form,  nor  ritual  word, 

But  simply  following  thee. 

We  bring  no  ghastly  holocaust, 

We  pile  no  graven  stone  ; 
He  serves  thee  best  who  loveth  most 

His  brothers  and  thy  own. 


152  OUR   MASTER. 

Thy  litanies,  sweet  offices 

Of  love  and  gratitude  ; 
Thy  sacramental  liturgies, 

The  joy  of  doing  good. 

In  vain  shall  waves  of  incense  drift 

The  vaulted  nave  around, 
In  vain  the  minster  turret  lift 

Its  brazen  weights  of  sound. 

The  heart  must  ring  thy  Christmas  bells, 

Thy  inward  altars  raise ; 
Its  faith  and  hope  thy  canticles, 

And  its  obedience  praise ! 


THE  VANISHEES.  153 


THE   VANISHERS. 

SWEETEST  of  all  childlike  dreams 
In  the  simple  Indian  lore 

Still  to  me  the  legend  seems 
Of  the  shapes  who  flit  before. 

Flitting,  passing,  seen  and  gone, 
Never  reached  nor  found  at  rest, 

Baffling  search,  but  beckoning  on 
To  the  Sunset  of  the  Blest. 

From  the  clefts  of  mountain  rocks, 
Through  the  dark  of  lowland  firs, 

Flash  the  eyes  and  flow  the  locks 
Of  the  mystic  Vanishers  ! 
7* 


154  THE   VANISHERS. 

And  the  fisher  in  his  skiff, 
And  the  hunter  on  the  moss, 

Hear  their  call  from  cape  and  cliff, 
See  their  hands  the  birch-leaves  toss. 

Wistful,  longing,  through  the  green 
Twilight  of  the  clustered  pines, 

In  their  faces  rarely  seen 
Beauty  more  than  mortal  shines. 

Fringed  with  gold  their  mantles  flow 
On  the  slopes  of  westering  knolls  ; 

In  the  wind  they  whisper  low 
Of  the  Sunset  Land  of  Souls. 

Doubt  who  may,  O  friend  of  mine! 

Thou  and  I  have  seen  them  too  ; 
On  before  with  beck  and  sign 

Still  they  glide,  and  we  pursue. 


THE   VANISHERS.  155 

More  than  clouds  of  purple  trail 

In  the  gold  of  setting  day ; 
More  than  gleams  of  wing  or  sail 

Beckon  from  the  sea-mist  gray. 

Glimpses  of  immortal  youth, 

Gleams  and  glories  seen  and  flown, 

Far-heard  voices  sweet  with  truth, 
Airs  from  viewless  Eden  blown,  — 

Beauty  that  eludes  our  grasp, 

Sweetness  that  transcends  our  taste, 

Loving  hands  we  may  not  clasp, 
Shining  feet  that  mock  our  haste, — 

Gentle  eyes  we  closed  below, 

Tender  voices  heard  once  more, 
Smile  and  call  us,  as  they  go 

On  and  onward,  still  before. 


156  THE   VANISHERS. 

Guided  thus,  O  friend  of  mine  ! 

Let  us  walk  our  little  way, 
Knowing  by  each  beckoning  sign 

That  we  are  not  quite  astray. 

Chase  we  still  with  baffled  feet, 
Smiling  eye  and  waving  hand, 

Sought  and  seeker  soon  shall  meet, 
Lost  and  found,  in  Sunset  Land  ! 


REVISITED.  157 


REVISITED. 

READ  AT  THE   "LAURELS,"   ON  THE   MERRIMACK, 
6TH   MONTH,    1865. 

THE  roll  of  drums  and  the  bugle's  wailing 
Vex  the  air  of  our  vales  no  more  ; 

The  spear  is  beaten  to  hooks  of  pruning, 
The  share  is  the  sword  the  soldier  wore 

Sing  soft,  sing  low,  our  lowland  river, 
Under  thy  banks  of  laurel  bloom  ; 

Softly  and  sweet,  as  the  hour  beseem  eth, 
Sing  us  the  songs  of  peace  and  home. 

Let  all  the  tenderer  voices  of  nature 
Temper  the  triumph  and  chasten  mirth, 

Full  of  the  infinite  love  and  pity 

For  fallen  martyr  and  darkened  hearth. 


158  REVISITED. 

But  to  Him  who  gives  us  beauty  for  ashes, 
And  the  oil  of  joy  for  mourning  long, 

Let  thy  hills  give  thanks,  and  all  thy  waters 
Break  into  jubilant  waves  of  song ! 

Bring  us  the  airs  of  hills  and  forests, 
The  sweet  aroma  of  birch  and  pine, 

Give  us  a  waft  of  the  north-wind,  laden 
With  sweet-brier  odors  and  breath  of  kine ! 

Bring  us  the  purple  of  mountain  sunsets, 
Shadows  of  clouds  that  rake  the  hills, 

The  green  repose  of  thy  Plymouth  meadows, 
The  gleam  and  ripple  of  Campton  rills. 

Lead  us  away  in  shadow  and  sunshine, 
Slaves  of  fancy,  through  all  thy  miles, 

The  winding  ways  of  Pemigewasset, 
And  Winnipesaukee's  hundred  isles. 


REVISITED.  159 

Shatter  in  sunshine  over  thy  ledges, 
Laugh  in  thy  plunges  from  fall  to  fall ; 

Play  with  thy  fringes  of  elms,  and  darken 
Under  the  shade  of  the  mountain  wall. 

The  cradle-song  of  thy  hillside  fountains 
Here  in  thy  glory  and  strength  repeat ; 

Give  us  a  taste  of  thy  upland  music, 
Show  us  the  dance  of  thy  silver  feet. 

Into  thy  dutiful  life  of  uses 

Pour  the  music  and  weave  the  flowers  ; 
With  the  song  of  birds  and  bloom  of  meadows 

Lighten  and  gladden  thy  heart  and  ours. 

Sing  on  !  bring  down,  O  lowland  river, 
The  joy  of  the  hills  to  the  waiting  sea  ; 

The  wealth  of  the  vales,  the  pomp  of  mountains, 
The  breath  of  the  woodlands,  bear  with  thee. 


I6O  REVISITED. 

Here,  in  the  calm  of  thy  seaward  valley, 

. 

Mirth  and  labor  shall  hold  their  truce  ; 

Dance  of  water  and  mill  of  grinding, 

. 
Both  are  beauty  and  both  are  use. 

Type  of  the  Northland's  strength  and  glory, 
Pride  and  hope  of  our  home  and  race,  — 

Freedom  lending  to  rugged  labor 
Tints  of  beauty  and  lines  of  grace. 

Once  again,  O  beautiful  river, 

Hear  our  greetings  and  take  our  thanks  ; 
Hither  we  come,  as  Eastern  pilgrims 

Throng  to  the  Jordan's  sacred  banks. 

. 
For  though  by  the  Master's  feet  untrodden, 

Though  never  his  word  has  stilled  thy  waves, 
Well  for  us  may  thy  shores  be  holy, 

With  Christian  altars  and  saintly  graves. 


REVISITED.  l6l 

And  well  may  we  own  thy  hint  and  token 
Of  fairer  valleys  and  streams  than  these, 

Where  the  rivers  of  God  are  full  of  water, 
And  full  of  sap  are  his  healing  trees ! 


1 62  THE    COMMON    QUESTION. 


THE    COMMON    QUESTION. 

BEHIND  us  at  our  evening  meal 

The  gray  bird  ate  his  fill, 
Swung  downward  by  a  single  claw, 

And  wiped  his  hooked  bill. 

He  shook  his  wings  and  crimson  tail, 

And  set  his  head  aslant, 
And,  in  his  sharp,  impatient  way, 

Asked,  "  What  does  Charlie  want  ? " 

"Fie,  silly  bird!"  I  answered,  "tuck 
Your  head  beneath  your  wing, 

And  go  to  sleep "  ;  —  but  o'er  and  o'er 
He  asked  the  selfsame  thing. 


THE    COMMON    QUESTION.  163 

Then,  smiling,  to  myself  I  said :  — 

How  like  are  men  and  birds ! 
We  all  are  saying  what  he  says, 

In  action  or  in  words. 

The  boy  with  whip  and  top  and  drum, 

The  girl  with  hoop  and  doll, 
And  men  with  lands  and  houses,  ask 

The  question  of  Poor  Poll. 

However  full,  with  something  more 

We  fain  the  bag  would  cram ; 
We  sigh  above  our  crowded  nets 

For  fish  that  never  swam. 

No  bounty  of  indulgent  Heaven 

The  vague  desire  can  stay ; 
Self-love  is  still  a  Tartar  mill 

For  grinding  prayers  alway. 


164  THE    COMMON    QUESTION. 

The  dear  God  hears  and  pities  all ; 

He  knoweth  all  our  wants ; 
And  what  we  blindly  ask  of  him 

His  love  withholds  or  grants. 

And  so  I  sometimes  think  our  prayers 
Might  well  be  merged  in  one ; 

And  nest  and  perch  and  hearth  and  church 
Repeat,  "Thy  will  be  done." 


BRYANT   ON   HIS   BIRTHDAY.  165 


BRYANT    ON    HIS    BIRTHDAY. 

WE  praise  not  now  the  poet's  art, 
The  rounded  beauty  of  his  song ; 

Who  weighs  him  from  his  life  apart 
Must  do  his  nobler  nature  wrong. 

Not  for  the  eye,  familiar  grown 

With  charms  to  common  sight  denied, — 
The  marvellous  gift  he  shares  alone 

With  him  who  walked  on  Rydal-side ;. 

Not  for  rapt  hymn  nor  woodland  lay, 

Too  grave  for  smiles,  too  sweet  for  tears  ; 

We  speak  his  praise  who  wears  to-day 
The  glory  of  his  seventy  years. 


1 66  BRYANT   ON   HIS    BIRTHDAY. 

When  Peace  brings  Freedom  in  her  train, 
Let  happy  lips  his  songs  rehearse  ; 

His  life  is  now  his  noblest  strain, 
His  manhood  better  than  his  verse  ! 

Thank  God  !   his  hand  on  Nature's  keys 
Its  cunning  keeps  at  life's  full  span  ; 

But,  dimmed  and  dwarfed,  in  times  like  these, 
The  poet  seems  beside  the  man  ! 

So  be  it !   let  the  garlands  die, 
The  singer's  wreath,  the  painter's  meed, 

Let  our  names  perish,  if  thereby 

Our  country  may  be  saved  and  freed  ! 


HYMN.  167 

HYMN 

FOR  THE  OPENING  OF  THOMAS  STARR  KING'S  HOUSE  OF  WORSHIP, 

I864. 

AMIDST  these  glorious  works  of  thine, 
The  solemn  minarets  of  the  pine, 
And  awful  Shasta's  icy  shrine,  — 

Where  swell  thy  hymns  from  wave  and  gale, 
And  organ-thunders  never  fail, 
Behind  the  cataract's  silver  veil,  — 

Our  puny  walls  to  Thee  we  raise, 

Our  poor  reed-music  sounds  thy  praise  : 

Forgive,  O  Lord,  our  childish  ways  ! 

For,  kneeling  on  these  altar-stairs, 

We  urge  Thee  not  with  selfish  prayers, 

Nor  murmur  at  our  daily  cares. 


1 68  HYMN. 

Before  Thee,  in  an  evil  day, 

Our  country's  bleeding  heart  we  lay, 

And  dare  not  ask  thy  hand  to  stay  ; 

But,  through  the  war-cloud,  pray  to  thee 
For  union,  but  a  union  free, 
With  peace  that  comes  of  purity ! 

That  Thou  wilt  bare  thy  arm  to  save, 
And,  smiting  through  this  Red  Sea  wave, 
Make  broad  a  pathway  for  the  slave  ! 

For  us,  confessing  all  our  need, 

We  trust  nor  rite  nor  word  nor  deed, 

Nor  yet  the  broken  staff  of  creed. 

Assured  alone  that  Thou  art  good 
To  each,  as  to  the  multitude, 
Eternal  Love  and  Fatherhood,  — 


HYMN.  169 

Weak,  sinful,  blind,  to  Thee  we  kneel, 
Stretch  dumbly  forth  our  hands,  and  feel 
Our  weakness  is  our  strong  appeal. 

So,  by  these  Western  gates  of  Even 
We  wait  to  see  with  thy  forgiven 
The  opening  Golden  Gate  of  Heaven  ! 

Suffice  it  now.     In  time  to  be 
Shall  holier  altars  rise  to  thee, — 
Thy  Church  our  broad  humanity! 

White  flowers  of  love  its  walls  shall  climb, 
Soft  bells  of  peace  shall  ring  its  chime, 
Its  days  shall  all  be  holy  time. 

A  sweeter  song  shall  then  be  heard, — 
The  music  of  the  world's  accord 
Confessing  Christ,  the  Inward  Word ! 


I/O  HYMN. 

That  song  shall  swell  from  shore  to  shore, 
One  hope,  one  faith,  one  love,  restore 
The  seamless  robe  that  Jesus  wore. 


THOMAS   STARR   KING. 


THOMAS    STARR    KING. 

THE  great  work  laid  upon  his  twoscore  years 
Is  done,  and  well  done.     If  we  drop  our  tears, 
Who  loved  him  as  few  men  were  ever  loved, 
We  mourn  no  blighted  hope  nor  broken  plan 
With  him  whose  life  stands  rounded  and  approved 
In  the  full  growth  and  stature  of  a  man. 
Mingle,  O  bells,  along  the  Western  slope, 
With  your  deep  toll  a  sound  of  faith  and  hope  ! 
Wave  cheerily  still,  O  banner,  half-way  down, 
From  thousand-masted  bay  and  steepled  town  ! 
Let  the  strong  organ  with  its  loftiest  swell 
Lift  the  proud  sorrow  of  the  land,  and  tell 
That  the  brave  sower  saw  his  ripened  grain. 


1/2  THOMAS    STARR   KING. 

O  East  and  West !   O  morn  and  sunset  twain 
No  more  forever  !  —  has  he  lived  in  vain 
Who,  priest  of  Freedom,  made  ye  one,  and  told 
Your  bridal  service  from  his  lips  of  gold  ? 


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